februo

Forms

februō (present infinitive februāre, perfect active februāvī, supine februātum); first conjugation^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin februum (“means of purification”) + -ō.^[2][1] The OLD derives it from the plural ⟨februa⟩, the rites of purification, and de Vaan lists it among the derivatives of the noun.^[3][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Varro is its first author.^[4][2] In a fragment quoted by Nonius he says that in their rites, when cakes have been made, people throw grains of spelt on them and say that they februāre them, that is, make them pure;^[5][6] in his work on the Latin language he names February after the day when the people is purified, februātur.^[2][7]

Semantic evolution

It was an old religious word, which Lewis & Short call ante-classical.^[5][1] It belonged to the purification of the Lupercalia: Festus, in Paul the Deacon's abridgement, says that on that day the women were purified by the Luperci with Juno's cloak, the goat's skin,^[2] and a scholiast on Juvenal says that barren women offered themselves to the Luperci who purified them.^[2] The participle februātus was used of the day of purification and of Juno Februata.^[2] A medieval poem in the MLW explains the name of February by saying that the Latins call purifying februāre.^[8]

Timeline

• 116–27 BC – Varro explains it as “to make pure”.^[2][5][9]
• c. 400 AD – A scholiast on Juvenal uses it of the Luperci purifying barren women.^[2][9]
• 8th century AD – Paul the Deacon's abridgement of Festus uses it of the women purified at the Lupercalia.^[2][9]

Meanings

Verb

1. To purify, expiate (in religious rites).^{[3][5][6][10]}
2. februātus: purified; of the day of purification, diēs februātus.^[2]

Related words

• februum
• Februārius

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
3. ^ a b Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
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 c d Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
7. ^ Marcus Terentius Varro, De lingua Latina (text of The Latin Library; book and paragraph numbers as there).
8. ^ Mittellateinisches Wörterbuch bis zum ausgehenden 13. Jahrhundert (1967–), Munich: C. H. Beck; Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
9. ^ a b c Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
10. ^ Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.