ganea

Forms

gānea f (genitive gāneae); first declension^[1]

Etymology

The origin is uncertain.^[2][3] De Vaan treats it with the older neuter gāneum and thinks it probably a loanword: in form and meaning it may be connected with West Semitic words for a garden, such as Biblical Hebrew גַּן (gan, “garden”), the source also of Ancient Greek γάνος (gános, “pleasure garden”); for the meaning he compares eating-places named after gardens, like German Biergarten.^[4][1] Lewis and Short had derived it from a form with /sn/, akin to Sanskrit घस् (ghas, “to eat”), as a place for eating.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

De Vaan and Köbler record gānea first in Cicero,^[4][3] who speaks of standing for a while in the smell and smoke of someone's eating-houses, in illo ganearum tuarum nidore atque fumo.^[5]

Semantic evolution

It named a common eating-house or cook-shop, typically the resort of disreputable people and also of prostitutes.^[2][5] By metonymy it meant gluttonous eating and debauchery: Cicero describes a man worn out by wine, gluttony, pimping and adultery, Sallust names a passion for ganeae beside lust, and Tacitus speaks of satisfying the insatiable appetites of Vitellius with lavish feasts and gluttony.^[2][5]

In Medieval Latin it kept the senses eating-house and feasting, and was used of a theatre and of a harlot;^[6][7] Niermeyer gives the classical sense as brothel and the medieval one as harlot.^[7]

Timeline

• 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it of eating-houses and of gluttony.^[2][5][3]
• 86–34 BC – Sallust uses it among the vices of his time.^[5][3]
• 59 BC–17 AD – Livy uses in ganea lustrisque.^[5][3]
• 98–115 AD – Tacitus uses it of the feasts of Vitellius.^[2][5][3]

Meanings

Noun

1. A common eating-house, cook-shop, frequented by disreputable people.^[2][5][1]
2. (by metonymy) Gluttony, debauchery.^[2][5]
3. (Medieval Latin) A harlot.^[7][6]

Word family

• ganearius
• gāneō

Related words

• gāneum

Usage notes

The neuter gāneum is the pre-classical form, found in Plautus and Terence.^[5][4]

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
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 d e f g h i j k Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b 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
7. ^ a b c Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill