februum

Forms

februum n (genitive februī); second declension^[1] Varro also has februm; the plural februa, -ōrum is found in Ovid and Festus.^[2]

Etymology

The origin is uncertain.^[2][1] De Vaan takes it as a noun made from an adjective ⟨*februus⟩ “purifying”, which presupposes an older ⟨*febro-⟩ “purification”; his reconstruction is inherited from Proto-Italic *f(w)esro- or *feχwro-.^[2] The first would match Walde and Hofmann's Proto-Indo-European *dʰu̯es-ro- (“the smoking”), with a shift of meaning from smoking to purifying.^[2] He cannot rule out that it shares the root of febris “fever”, *dʰegʷʰ-ri-: ⟨*febro-⟩ would then have meant “a burning, an offering”.^[2] Wiktionary follows this second view and calls the word a doublet of the noun for fever.^[1]

Varro says that februum was the Sabine word for a means of purification.^[3][4] Wiktionary doubts this, since a Sabellic form would have ⟨-fr-⟩ rather than ⟨-br-⟩, and suggests that the word was simply old Latin religious vocabulary.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

De Vaan's first author is Varro,^[2] who says in On the Latin Language that the Sabines called a purgation februum and that the word was used in Roman rites.^[3][4]

Semantic evolution

The word was always religious and archaic.^[1] Varro calls the Lupercalia a februātiō and derives the name of February from the day of purification,^[3][4] and Ovid writes that the Roman fathers called means of expiation februa.^[4][5][6] The plural named the festival of purification held in the month named after it, and Juno worshipped there was called Februālis or Februlis.^[4]

Timeline

• 116–27 BC – Varro calls it a Sabine word for a means of purification.^[3][4][2]
• 43 BC–18 AD – Ovid uses the plural februa in the Fasti.^[4][5][7]
• 8th century AD – Paul the Deacon's abridgement of Festus explains it.^[7][2]

Meanings

Noun

1. A means of purification, an expiatory offering.^[2][4][5]
2. (plural, februa) The Roman festival of purification held in February.^[4]

Word family

• februō
• februālis
• Februārius
• februātiō
• februātus

Related words

• febris

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 de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
3. ^ a b c d Marcus Terentius Varro, De lingua Latina (text of The Latin Library; book and paragraph numbers as there).
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ a b c Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
6. ^ Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
7. ^ a b Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de