Etymologically
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illucesco

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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [ɪl.luːˈkeːs.koː][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [il.luˈt͡ʃɛs.ko][1]

Forms

illūcēscō (present infinitive illūcēscere, perfect active illūxī); third conjugation, no supine stem[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin in- + lūcēscō (“to begin to shine”), an inchoative verb.[2][3][4] lūcēscō belongs with lūceō (“to shine”) and lūx (“light”), which de Vaan traces to Proto-Italic *louk- (“light”) and Proto-Indo-European *leuk- (“light”), the root of Ancient Greek λευκός (leukós, “clear, white”).[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLL reads it from Plautus on.[3] In the Amphitruo it is transitive, of day shining on mortals with clear light, and in the Persa a speaker says that a profitable day has dawned.[2]

Semantic evolution

Its usual sense is intransitive, of the day dawning or the sun beginning to shine, most often in the perfect tenses: Cicero says that a day will one day dawn, and of a day that as soon as it dawned the dead were found.[4][2] Livy uses it impersonally, "when it grew light".[2] Figuratively it means to shine out: in the speech on the agrarian law Cicero speaks of the voice and authority of a consul suddenly shining out in such darkness.[2] Stelten gives "shine upon, give light, enlighten" for Church Latin.[6] It is also spelled illūcīscō and inl-.[4][3]

Timeline

  • c. 250–184 BC – Plautus of a day that has dawned.[2][3]
  • 81–43 BC – Cicero of the consul's voice shining out in the darkness.[2]
  • 59 BC–17 AD – Livy impersonally, "when it grew light".[2]

Meanings

Verb

  1. (transitive) To shine on.[2][1]
  2. (of day) To begin to grow light, dawn, break;[2][4][1] (of the sun) to begin to shine;[2][4][1] (impersonal) it dawns.[2][4][1]
  3. (figurative) To shine out; to enlighten.[2][6]

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 c d Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
  4. ^ a b c d e f Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  5. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
  6. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson