foedo

Forms

foedō (present infinitive foedāre, perfect active foedāvī, supine foedātum); first conjugation^[1]

Etymology

It is formed from the adjective foedus (“foul, hideous”) as a first-conjugation verb.^[2][3][1] De Vaan, after Walde–Hofmann and Nussbaum, takes the first sense of that adjective to be “frightful”, and derives it from Proto-Italic *fo(j)iþo- (“afraid”) and the root Proto-Indo-European *bʰiH- (“to be afraid”), cognate with Sanskrit बिभाय (bibháya, “is afraid”) and Lithuanian bijóti (“to fear”).^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The OLD's earliest example is Plautus, whose soldiers hack and trample the enemy forces.^[2]

Semantic evolution

Its senses are “to make filthy, soil”, as Catullus' old man fouling his grey hair with dust, and “to defile something holy”: Cicero writes of the holiest shrines defiled.^[2] It is also to disfigure, as eyes spoiled with tears in Tibullus, to darken the light, to mangle, and to ravage land, as in Livy.^[2] Morally it is “to disgrace, dishonour”: in Plautus a young man admits he has disgraced his inheritance and his ancestors' glory.^[2] The TLL notes that it became common with the Augustan poets, and Lewis and Short call it mostly poetic and post-Augustan.^[3][5]

Church Latin glosses it “disfigure, pollute, defile, mar, make foul”.^[6]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus of mangling the enemy and of disgrace.^[2][7]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero of defiled shrines.^[2][7]
• 81/79–52/50 BC – Catullus of hair fouled with dust.^[2][7]
• 59 BC–17 AD – Livy of ravaged fields.^[2][7]

Meanings

Verb

1. To make foul, soil; to defile, pollute; to corrupt.^[2][5][1][6]
2. To disfigure, mar; to darken.^[2][1][6]
3. To mangle, mutilate; to ravage land.^[2]
4. To disgrace, dishonour.^[2][1]

Word family

• confoedō

Related words

• foedus

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g 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 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 Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b c Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
7. ^ a b c d Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de