Etymologically
Log in

exaro

This is the current revision of this entry, as edited by bogdan on 20 October 2026 at 13:22. This address is a permanent link to this version.
Changes in this edit History

Pronunciation

  • Classical: [ˈɛk.sa.roː][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [ˈɛk.sa.ro][1]

Forms

exarō (present infinitive exarāre, perfect active exarāvī, supine exarātum); first conjugation[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin ex- + arō (“to plough”).[2][1][3] De Vaan traces arō to Proto-Italic *araje/o- and Proto-Indo-European *h₂erh₃-ie/o- (“to plough”).[4] Cognate with Middle Irish airim (“to plough”), Ancient Greek ἀρόω (aróō, “to plough”) and Lithuanian árti (“to plough”).[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLL finds it from Cato on;[3] Cato writes of ploughing up roots, radices exarabit.[2]

Semantic evolution

Its first sense is to remove or destroy by ploughing, to plough up or dig up, as roots or, in Cicero's De legibus, tombs.[2][5] It is also to plough land: Varro says that a iugum is what a yoke of oxen can plough in a day.[2] Cicero uses it of producing by tillage, money that the farmer does not raise from the soil.[2] It also means to write, to pen: Cicero tells Atticus he has scribbled a little letter as he left his villa.[2] Wiktionary also gives a figurative sense “to flog severely”.[1] Church Latin has it as to write on wax, to plough, to dig up, and to print.[6]

Timeline

  • 234–149 BC – Cato, of ploughing up roots.[2][3][7]
  • 116–27 BC – Varro, of ploughing land.[2][7]
  • 81–43 BC – Cicero, of writing a letter.[2][7]

Meanings

Verb

  1. To plough up, dig up, destroy by ploughing.[2][5][1]
  2. To plough, till land.[2][1]
  3. To produce by tillage.[2][1]
  4. To write, properly with a stylus on wax, to pen.[2][1][6]
  5. (figurative) To flog severely.[1]

Word family

  • exarātiō

References

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