Etymologically
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excepto

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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [ɛksˈkɛp.toː][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [eksˈt͡ʃɛp.to][1]

Forms

exceptō (present infinitive exceptāre, perfect active exceptāvī, supine exceptātum); first conjugation[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin excipiō (“to take out, receive”) + -tō, a frequentative formed on the participle ⟨exceptus⟩.[2][3][4] excipiō is a compound of ex- and capiō (“to take, seize”).[5][6]

Earliest recorded meaning

Its first known use is in Cicero's Paradoxa Stoicorum, of a man who takes bearded mullets out of his fishpond.[2][3][7]

Semantic evolution

It is a rare word.[3] Caesar uses it of pulling men up one by one,[8][9][7] and Virgil of mares that catch the light breezes, which Servius explains as “receive often”.[2][10] Seneca uses it of catching something with open mouth, Silius Italicus of receiving deaths in the breast and Tacitus of receiving wounds.[8][7] The TLL notes that manuscripts often confuse it with exspectō.[10]

Timeline

  • 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it of taking fish out of a pond.[2][5]
  • c. 50 BC – Caesar uses it of pulling men up onto a wall.[8][5]
  • 70–19 BC – Virgil uses it of mares catching the breezes.[2][5]
  • 98–115 AD – Tacitus uses it of receiving wounds.[7][5]

Meanings

Verb

  1. To take out or up, pick out; to pull up.[2][8][9]
  2. To take in, receive; to catch (breezes, wounds and the like), inhale.[2][8][1]

Word family

  • exceptaculum

Usage notes

Medieval Latin has an adverb and preposition exceptō “except, with the exception of; besides, moreover”, used in charters and glossed into Old High German.[11][5]

References

  1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  4. ^ Bianchi, Rossella; Lelli, Olga (2014), VOLI: Vocabolario di latino, Florence: Le Monnier
  5. ^ a b c d e f Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
  6. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
  7. ^ a b c d Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
  8. ^ a b c d e Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
  9. ^ a b Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
  10. ^ a b Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
  11. ^ Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill