iatraliptes

Forms

iātraliptēs m (genitive iātraliptae); first declension^[1][2] Celsus has the spelling iatroaliptēs, and an inscription iatrolipt-.^[3][1] Gaffiot also gives a form iātralīpta.^[4]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ancient Greek ἰατραλείπτης (iatraleíptēs).^[1][5][6][3] Köbler compares ἰατρός (iātrós, “physician”).^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is first found in Celsus, who writes that a healthy man should bind himself by no rules and need neither a physician nor an iatraliptes (neque medico neque iatroalipta egere).^[3]

Semantic evolution

Pliny the Elder explains that it first named the physician's assistant who anointed the patient, and Georges notes that it later named the physician himself, who healed by external means and a prescribed way of life.^[2] In Petronius three masseurs drink Falernian wine (tres interim iatraliptae … Falernum potabant).^[3] Pliny the Younger asked Trajan for Roman citizenship for his iatraliptes Harpocras, whom he had engaged during a grave illness.^[3][2]

Timeline

• 14–37 AD – Celsus uses it beside medicus.^[3][6]
• before 66 AD – Petronius uses it of masseurs.^[3][6]
• 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder explains it as the physician's assistant.^[2][6]

Meanings

Noun

1. A masseur, one who treats the body by anointing and rubbing.^[1][3][4]
2. A physician who heals by such external means and by regimen.^[2]

Word family

• iātralīpticē

References

1. ^ a b c d Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
2. ^ a b c d e Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ a b Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
5. ^ Saalfeld, Günther Alexander (1874), Index Graecorum vocabulorum in linguam latinam translatorum, Berlin: Weidmann
6. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de