dramaticus

Forms

drāmaticus (feminine drāmatica, neuter drāmaticum); first/second-declension adjective^[1][2] The Greek form ⟨drāmaticos⟩, neuter ⟨drāmaticon⟩, also occurs.^[1][2][3] Medieval spellings include ⟨drammaticus⟩, ⟨dragmaticus⟩ and ⟨tragmaticus⟩.^[4][5]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ancient Greek δραματικός (dramatikós, “dramatic, of plays”).^[6][5][3] The Greek adjective is formed from δρᾶμα (drâma, “deed, action; play”).^[5][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLL's earliest example is in Porphyrio's commentary on Horace: of the ninth satire of the first book he says that the poet varies the whole conversation in dramatic style, by alternating speech.^[3][5]

Semantic evolution

The grammarians made it a term of poetics.^[3] Diomedes divides poems into three kinds, one of them active or imitative, which the Greeks call dramaticon or mimeticon: in it the characters speak alone, without any words of the poet, as in tragedies and comedies.^[3][1] Dositheus, Servius on the Eclogues and the commentaries on Donatus use it in the same way.^[3] In a wider sense it was said of any dialogue, as by Chalcidius;^[3] Donatus has the adverb drāmaticē, in the manner of a play.^[3]

Medieval writers kept the grammarians' sense: Hrotsvitha says in the preface to her second book that she has bound her humble work in dramatic sequence,^[4] a medieval collection calls a poem dramatic when only characters are brought in, without the author,^[4] and an introduction to the school authors counts three modes of recitation and says that Ovid uses the dramatic one.^[4] A Bohemian dictionary also records the sense “in questions and answers”.^[8] English took dramatic from it in the 1580s.^[7]

Timeline

• 2nd half of the 2nd century AD – Porphyrio uses it of a satire of Horace in dialogue.^[3][5]
• c. 300 AD – Chalcidius applies it to dialogues.^[3][5]
• c. 310–380 AD – Dositheus uses it in his grammar.^[3][5]
• 2nd half of the 4th century AD – Diomedes defines the dramatic kind of poem.^[3][1][5]
• c. 400 AD – Servius uses it on the Eclogues.^[3][5]
• 1580s – English dramatic is recorded.^[7]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Of drama, dramatic; of a poem in which only the characters speak, without the poet's narration.^[1][3][2][9]
2. (Late Latin) In dialogue form.^[3][4]
3. (Medieval Latin) Set out in questions and answers.^[8]

Related words

• drāma
• English dramatic

References

1. ^ a b c d e Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
2. ^ a b c Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ a b c d e Mittellateinisches Wörterbuch bis zum ausgehenden 13. Jahrhundert (1967–), Munich: C. H. Beck; Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
6. ^ Saalfeld, Günther Alexander (1874), Index Graecorum vocabulorum in linguam latinam translatorum, Berlin: Weidmann
7. ^ a b c Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
8. ^ a b Latinitatis medii aevi lexicon Bohemorum / Slovník středověké latiny v českých zemích (1977–), Prague: Academia; electronic version, Institute of Philosophy of the Czech Academy of Sciences
9. ^ Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson