Etymologically
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duodecimus

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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [du.ɔˈdɛ.kɪ.mʊs][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [du.oˈdɛː.t͡ʃi.mus][1]

Forms

duodecimus (feminine duodecima, neuter duodecimum); first/second-declension numeral[1] Manuscripts of Caesar, Vitruvius, Pliny the Elder and Tacitus also have duodecumus.[2][3] An inscription has dodecimus.[4][2]

Etymology

It is from Latin duodecim (“twelve”), its ordinal,[1][5] formed after decimus (“tenth”).[3][2]

Earliest recorded meaning

Köbler dates it from Cato.[5]

Semantic evolution

It is “twelfth”, and pars duodecima or duodecima alone is a twelfth part.[3] Lewis & Short call it a common word in Caesar, who has the twelfth legion many times, and Tacitus uses it of a legion too.[6][4] The neuter duodecimō is an adverb, “for the twelfth time”, of a consul in the Historia Augusta.[6][4] In Church Latin it keeps the sense “twelfth”.[7]

Timeline

  • 234–149 BC – Cato has the word.[5]
  • c. 50 BC – Caesar, of the twelfth legion.[6][5]
  • 98–115 AD – Tacitus, of a legion.[4][5]

Meanings

Numeral

  1. Twelfth.[3][6][1]
  2. pars duodecima, or duodecima alone: a twelfth part.[3]

Usage notes

The adverb duodecimō, “for the twelfth time”, is the neuter ablative.[6][4]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
  3. ^ a b c d e Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  4. ^ a b c d e Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
  5. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
  6. ^ a b c d e Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson