exemplaris

Forms

exemplāris (neuter exemplāre); third-declension two-termination adjective^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin exemplum + -āris,^[2][1][3] Köbler tracing the noun further to eximō.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Tacitus, in the Histories, has the masculine plural used as a noun, exemplares, for copies of letters.^[5][6][2]

Semantic evolution

The noun use “copy” stayed rare: besides Tacitus it is found in Fronto, of copies of books.^[5][6] As an adjective the word meant “serving as an example or pattern”.^[5][3] Tertullian uses it in a general way,^[3] and in Late Latin philosophy it was applied to the Platonic ideas: Calcidius, translating the Timaeus, calls the intelligible world the model from which the visible one is copied,^[3][6] and Macrobius calls the highest virtues, which dwell in the divine mind, virtutes exemplares.^[3][5]

Medieval writers used it of a model handed down by one's forebears,^[7] of moral examples, and in philosophy for what is archetypal, notably the causa exemplaris or formal cause.^[8] Ecclesiastical Latin keeps the sense “exemplary”.^[9]

Timeline

• 98–115 AD – Tacitus uses exemplares for copies of letters.^[5][4]
• 100–170 AD – Fronto uses it of copies of books.^[6][4]
• c. 160–220 AD – Tertullian uses the adjective in a general sense.^[3][4]
• c. 300 AD – Calcidius applies it to the intelligible model of the world.^[3][4]
• first half of the 5th century AD – Macrobius names the highest virtues exemplares.^[5][4]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Serving as a pattern or example; exemplary.^[5][3][9]
2. (philosophy) Being the original model of something, archetypal.^[3][8]
3. (masculine plural as noun) Copies, transcripts.^[2][5]

Usage notes

The usual word for a copy is exemplar (plural exemplaria); exemplares in that sense is rare.^[5]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ a b c d e f Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b c d Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
7. ^ Mittellateinisches Wörterbuch bis zum ausgehenden 13. Jahrhundert (1967–), Munich: C. H. Beck; Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
8. ^ a b Latham, R. E., D. R. Howlett, R. K. Ashdowne, et al. (1975–2013), Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources, London: British Academy / Oxford University Press
9. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson