Etymologically
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immoderatus

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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [ɪm.mɔ.dɛˈraː.tʊs][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [im.mo.deˈraː.tus][1]

Forms

immoderātus (feminine immoderāta, neuter immoderātum, comparative immoderātior); first/second-declension adjective[1] It is also spelled inmoderātus.[2][3]

Etymology

It is from Latin in- (“not”) + moderātus (“moderate”).[2][1] The participle is from moderor (“to control, restrain”), which de Vaan lists among the derivatives of modus “measure”.[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Köbler dates it from Laberius.[5] In Cicero's speech for Roscius of Ameria it is used of excessive storms beside violent winds.[2]

Semantic evolution

Of degree it is unlimited, excessive, and in poetry measureless: Cicero, translating Euripides, has the lofty, boundless ether, and Lucretius too has it of the boundless.[2][3] Of actions and appetites it is unrestrained: the Rhetorica ad Herennium calls immense desires infinite and unrestrained.[2] Of people it is intemperate: Cicero exclaims at an immoderate woman.[2] Church Latin glosses it without measure, immoderate, excessive.[6]

Timeline

  • 106–43 BC – Laberius.[5]
  • 81–43 BC – Cicero of excessive storms and boundless ether.[2][5]
  • 96–55 BC – Lucretius of the boundless.[3][5]

Meanings

Adjective

  1. Unlimited, excessive, immoderate;[2][3][1][6] (poetic) measureless, boundless.[2][3][1][6]
  2. Of actions and appetites, unrestrained, unbridled.[2][3][1]
  3. Of people, intemperate.[2][6]

Word family

  • immoderantia

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 Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c d e f Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  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 c d Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
  6. ^ a b c d Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson