impudenter
Forms
impudenter (not comparable)[1] The spelling inpudenter is also found.[2]
Etymology
It is from Latin impudēns (“shameless”) + -ter, the adverb of the adjective.[2][3] That adjective is formed with the negative prefix in- on pudēns (“modest”), from pudeō (“to be ashamed”).[4] De Vaan traces pudeō to Proto-Italic *pudē- (“to be ashamed or shy”), whose further origin is unclear: a connection with paviō (“to strike”), with a root Proto-Indo-European *speud- (“to press, hurry”), or with paveō (“to be frightened”) has been proposed.[4]
Earliest recorded meaning
The TLL and Köbler date it from Cicero,[5][3] who uses it of acting without any sense of shame, brazenly.[2]
Semantic evolution
It means shamelessly or impudently, and the TLL notes that the comparative and superlative are common from Cicero on.[2][5] A narrower sense is immodestly or indelicately, of speech: in a letter on obscene words Cicero quotes a philosopher who called one verb used “impudently” and another “more impudently still”, and replies that neither is obscene.[2] Ancient glossaries explain it with petulanter (“wantonly”) and importūnē (“unseasonably”).[5]
Timeline
Meanings
Adverb
Related words
References
- ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
- ^ a b c d e f g h Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
- ^ a b c Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
- ^ a b de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
- ^ a b c d Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften