effor

Forms

effor (present infinitive effārī, perfect active effātus sum); first conjugation, deponent^[1] It is defective: the forms in use are a few of the present and future, the perfect effātus, the imperative and the infinitive.^[2][3] It is also spelled ecf-.^[2]

Etymology

It is from Latin ex- + for (“to speak”).^[2][4] De Vaan traces ⟨for⟩ to Proto-Italic *fā- (“to speak”) and Proto-Indo-European *bʰeh₂- (“to speak”), cognate with Umbrian fato (“said”) and Ancient Greek φημί (phēmí, “I say”).^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

The OLD's earliest example is Ennius' Annals: “having uttered these words the father withdrew”.^[2]

Semantic evolution

It is “to utter, speak out”, especially solemn words, and to declare: Livy has the view that it was wrong to reveal what should be hidden.^[2] Cicero uses it of stating a proposition, and Virgil's Dido begins to speak and stops mid-word.^[2] As a word of the augurs it means to mark out by a spoken formula the space in which signs are watched: Varro says the augurs fixed the limit of the auspices outside the city.^[2][1]

Church Latin glosses it “utter, speak out”.^[6]

Timeline

• 204–169 BC – Ennius of words spoken.^[2][7]
• 116–27 BC – Varro of the augurs' formula.^[2][7]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero of stating a proposition.^[2][7]
• 70–19 BC – Virgil of Dido beginning to speak.^[2][7]

Meanings

Verb

1. To utter, speak out, declare; to state a proposition; to begin to speak.^[2][3][1][6]
2. (augury) To mark out a space by a spoken formula.^[2][1]

Word family

• effābilis
• effamen
• effatio
• effātum
• effātus

Related words

• for

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
4. ^ Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
5. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
6. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
7. ^ a b c d Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de