expeto

Forms

expetō (present infinitive expetere, perfect active expetīvī or expetiī, supine expetītum); third conjugation^[1] The perfect is expetīvī or expetiī.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is formed from Latin ex- + petō (“to seek, aim at”).^[2][3][1] De Vaan traces petō to Proto-Italic *pet-e/o- and a root Proto-Indo-European *pet- (“to fly”), with a shift from “fly” to “fly towards, try to get”; cognate with Ancient Greek πέτομαι (pétomai, “to fly”) and Sanskrit पतति (pátati, “flies”).^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Plautus has ut Iovis suprēmī multīs hostiīs pācem expetam, “to beg the peace of supreme Jupiter with many victims”.^[2]

Semantic evolution

Expetere is “to ask for, request” (Cicero: he sought help from him though absent), and “to exact” a penalty.^[2][5] It is to seek out a person, “to want, court” (Plautus: tē vult, tē quaerit), also with hostile intent (Ennius: adsunt, mē expetunt, “they are here, they are after me”).^[2][1] With things it is “to seek after, covet, aim at”, with an infinitive “to desire to”, and of a place “to make for”.^[2][5][1] Intransitively it is “to come about, befall” (Plautus: many things befall a slave).^[2][1]

Church Latin glosses it “to desire, seek eagerly”.^[6]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus: pācem expetam.^[2][7]
• 204–169 BC – Ennius: adsunt, mē expetunt.^[2][7]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero: ab hōc auxilium absente expetīvit.^[2][7]

Meanings

Verb

1. To ask for, request; to exact (a penalty).^[2][5][1]
2. To seek out, court (a person); to go after (an enemy).^[2][1]
3. To seek after, desire, covet.^[2][5][1][6]
4. To make for (a place).^[2]
5. (intransitive) To happen, befall.^[2][1]

Word family

• expetibilis
• expetītor

Related words

• expetēns
• expetenter
• expetessō
• expetissō
• expetitio
• expetitus
• petō
• appetō
• repetō

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ 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 c d 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