impluvium

Forms

impluvium n (genitive impluviī or impluvī); second declension^[1] The spelling inpluvium is also found.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is from Latin impluō (“to rain into”) + -ium (“noun suffix”),^[2][1] from in- and pluō (“to rain”).^[1] De Vaan traces that verb to Proto-Italic *plow-e/o- (“to rain”), from Proto-Indo-European *pleu-e/o- (“to swim, float”).^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is first found in Plautus,^[5] who uses it both of the basin in the floor of the atrium, where in the Amphitruo two crested snakes glide down into the impluvium, and of the opening in the roof above it, through which someone spies in the Miles gloriosus.^[2]

Semantic evolution

The OLD separates the two senses: the square basin in the floor of the atrium that caught the rainwater from the roof, perhaps sometimes the whole open space of the atrium, and the opening in the roof itself, also called compluvium.^[2] L&S take the opening as the literal sense and the basin as transferred.^[3] In great houses statues and even trees stood there: Cicero mentions fine statues standing by an impluvium, and Livy a palm that grew in one.^[2][6]

Medieval writers used it for a louver, a gutter or drainpipe, and figuratively for a shower of rain;^[7][8] Niermeyer gives the bare sense “rain”.^[7][8]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus uses it of the atrium basin and of the roof opening.^[2][5]
• 190–159 BC – Terence speaks of coming secretly over another's tiles through the impluvium.^[2][5]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero mentions statues standing by an impluvium.^[2][5]
• 59 BC–17 AD – Livy reports a palm tree that grew in an impluvium.^[2][5]
• c. 1047–1053 – Ekkehard IV uses it for rain getting in.^[5]

Meanings

Noun

1. The square basin in the floor of the atrium of a Roman house, which received the rainwater from the roof; perhaps also the open central area of the atrium.^[2][3][6]
2. The opening in the roof of the atrium through which the rain fell, the compluvium; a skylight.^[2][3]
3. (Medieval Latin) A louver, gutter or drainpipe.^[7]
4. (Medieval Latin) Rain; a shower of rain.^[8][7]

References

1. ^ a b c d e 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 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 e f Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
6. ^ a b Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
7. ^ a b c d 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
8. ^ a b c Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill