excavatio

Forms

excavātiō f (genitive excavātiōnis); third declension^[1][2]

Etymology

It is formed from Latin excavō + -tiō.^[3][4] The verb is formed from ex- and cavō (“to hollow out”),^[3] from cavus (“hollow”), which goes back to Proto-Italic *kawo- and Proto-Indo-European *ḱouH-ó- (“hollow”).^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Seneca uses it in the Natural Questions of the hollowing out of a stone by water.^[1][4]

Semantic evolution

The word stayed rare: the OLD, Lewis & Short and Gaffiot cite only Seneca's passage.^[3][1][2] Medieval Latin used it for a hollowing or a hollow, as when Albertus Magnus writes of the last drop that completes the hollowing of a stone.^[6] English borrowed it in the 1610s as excavation, the action of hollowing out; the sense of an excavated place followed in 1779.^[7]

Timeline

• 4 BC–65 AD – Seneca uses it of the hollowing of a stone.^[1][4]
• 1610s – English borrows it as excavation.^[7]

Meanings

Noun

1. A hollowing out, excavation.^[3][1]
2. (Medieval Latin) A hollow, cavity.^[6][2]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
2. ^ a b c Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
3. ^ a b c d Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b c 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 Mittellateinisches Wörterbuch bis zum ausgehenden 13. Jahrhundert (1967–), Munich: C. H. Beck; Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
7. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com