Etymologically
Log in

fluor

This is the current revision of this entry, as edited by bogdan on 24 October 2026 at 04:58. This address is a permanent link to this version.
Changes in this edit History

Pronunciation

  • Classical: [ˈfɫu.ɔr][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [ˈfluː.or][1]

Forms

fluor m (genitive fluōris); third declension[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin fluō (“to flow”) + -or.[2][1][3][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Its first authors are the medical writers Celsus, who uses it of diarrhoea, and Scribonius Largus, who uses it of discharges from the gums, of coughs with phlegm and of bloody fluxes in women.[2][3][4]

Semantic evolution

Besides the medical sense of a flux or discharge,[2][5] it meant any flow or stream:[2][6] Festus says that a slight flow of water is commonly called a brook,[2] Apuleius writes of the streams of rivers and of images flowing from bodies in an unbroken stream,[2][5] and the treatise On the World has it of the flow of a star, called a comet.[2][6] Late writers extended it: Solinus has the flow of the sea, Arnobius calls the winds a flow of air, and Nemesianus speaks of streams of milk.[5][6] Augustine uses it of the menses,[6][3] and the old Latin Bible of a man's discharge in Leviticus, where the Vulgate has fluxus.[3] The epitome of Festus explains Fluonia, a name of Juno, by the belief that she held back the flow of blood in conception.[3]

In Medieval Latin it meant a flow of tears and the watering of the eyes,[7][8] a catarrh or running nose,[7][8] diarrhoea and the menses,[7] the falling out of hair,[7][8] and figuratively a flow of words.[7] English fluor was taken from it in the 1660s as a chemists' term for easily melted minerals used as fluxes in smelting.[9]

Timeline

  • 14–37 AD – Celsus uses it of diarrhoea.[2][4]
  • c. 47 AD – Scribonius Largus uses it of discharges and bloody fluxes.[2][3][4]
  • c. 125–175 AD – Apuleius writes of the streams of rivers.[2][4]
  • 297–310 AD – Arnobius calls the winds a flow of air.[5][6][4]
  • 354–430 AD – Augustine uses it of the menses.[6][4]
  • 1660s – English borrows fluor as a term for minerals used as fluxes.[9]

Meanings

Noun

  1. (medicine) A morbid discharge, flux;[2][3] especially diarrhoea.[2][5][6]
  2. A flow, stream (of water or any substance).[2][5][6]
  3. (Late Latin) A liquid, a flood.[6][10]
  4. (Medieval Latin) A flow of tears; a catarrh; the menses; the falling out of hair.[7][8]
  5. (Medieval Latin, figuratively) A flow of words, eloquence.[7]

References

  1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c d e f g Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
  4. ^ a b c d e f g Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
  5. ^ a b c d e f Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h i Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
  7. ^ a b c d e f g Mittellateinisches Wörterbuch bis zum ausgehenden 13. Jahrhundert (1967–), Munich: C. H. Beck; Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
  8. ^ a b c d 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 Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  10. ^ Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill