folliculus

Forms

folliculus m (genitive folliculī); second declension^[1] A neuter folliculum is recorded by Paulus' epitome of Festus, Isidore and the glossaries.^[2]

Etymology

It is from Latin follis (“bag, bellows, ball”) + -culus, a diminutive.^[3][1][2] De Vaan connects follis with Proto-Celtic *bol-, as in Old Irish ball (“member, limb”) and Welsh balleg (“sack, purse”), but finds no further etymology.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

De Vaan, Köbler and the TLL find it first in Lucilius,^[4][5][2] who uses it of the body as the husk in which a person is clothed.^[6]

Semantic evolution

Its first sense was a small bag or sack:^[3][6] Livy has grain carried in sacks,^[6] and the Rhetorica ad Herennium and Cicero describe a convicted parricide's head wrapped in a bag, of wolf's skin in the former.^[3][6] Suetonius uses it of an inflated ball for exercise.^[3][6] By likeness it named the husk or skin of a seed, which Varro says is called the glume,^[3][6] a seed pod,^[3] the shell of a cicada in Lucretius,^[6] and a bladder or sac in animal bodies, such as the gall bladder in Pliny the Elder.^[3][6]

In Late Latin medicine Caelius Aurelianus uses it for a sac and for the bladder.^[6][1] English borrowed it in the early 15th century as follicle, a small sac in anatomy.^[7]

Timeline

• c. 180–102 BC – Lucilius uses it of the body as the soul's husk.^[6][5][4]
• 116–27 BC – Varro uses it of the husk of grain.^[3][6]
• 96–55 BC – Lucretius uses it of the shells of cicadas.^[6]
• 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder uses it of seed pods and the gall bladder.^[3]
• c. 75–c. 150 AD – Suetonius uses it of an inflated ball.^[3][6]
• 5th century AD – Caelius Aurelianus uses it in medicine for a sac and for the bladder.^[6][5]
• early 15th century – English borrows it as follicle.^[7]

Meanings

Noun

1. A small bag or sack.^[3][6]
2. An inflated ball.^[3][6]
3. The husk, shell or skin of a seed or fruit; a seed pod.^[3][6]
4. A bladder or sac in an animal body.^[3][6]
5. (Late Latin, medicine) A sac; the urinary bladder.^[6][1]

Word family

• folliculosus

Related words

• folleātus
• folleō
• follicō
• folligena
• follis
• follītim
• English follicle

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b c 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 Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com