incenatus

Forms

incēnātus (feminine incēnāta, neuter incēnātum); first/second-declension adjective^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin in- + cēnātus (“having dined”),^[2][3] the negative of the participle of cēnō (“to dine”);^[4] Köbler refers it to cēna (“dinner”).^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is first found in Plautus,^[4][3] in a joke in the Aulularia: superi incenati sunt et cenati inferi, those upstairs have had no dinner and those below have dined.^[2][3]

Semantic evolution

Plautus uses it again of an old man who is to be pushed out of the house without his dinner,^[2][3] and Cato's medical advice tells a patient to drink honeyed water and go to bed without eating.^[5][2] Lewis & Short note that it occurs before and after the classical period; the physician Scribonius Largus has it too.^[5][2]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus uses it of people who have not dined.^[2][4]
• 234–149 BC – Cato uses it in medical advice.^[2][4]
• c. 47 AD – Scribonius Largus uses it.^[2][4]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Not having dined, dinnerless;^[2][5] fasting.^[5][1]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i 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 Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
5. ^ a b c d Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press