incomitatus

Forms

incomitātus (feminine incomitāta, neuter incomitātum); first/second-declension adjective^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin in- (“not”) + comitātus (“accompanied”), with the negative prefix.^[2][3][1] The OLD takes the second part as the participle of comitō, Georges and Wiktionary as that of comitor (“to accompany”).^[2][3][1] The verb is formed from comes (“companion”), which de Vaan explains as a compound of com- and the root for “to go” with a suffix, Proto-Italic *kom-i-t- (“going together”), whose second part continues Proto-Indo-European *-h₁i-t- (“going, goer”).^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Köbler records it first in Lucretius,^[5] who has incomitata funera, funerals without a following.^[6][7] Varro, of the same period, writes that in Illyricum girls are allowed to roam about incomitatis, unescorted.^[2][7]

Semantic evolution

Lewis and Short call it rare and mostly poetic, and note that it is not in Cicero, where the right reading of De oratore 1.234 is incompta.^[6][8] It is used of people, especially women, in Varro and Virgil, of a litter in the younger Seneca, and in Silius Italicus' incomitata vestigia ferre, to walk alone.^[3][6] Figuratively Ovid has externis virtus incomitata bonis, virtue unaccompanied by outward goods, and Ambrose numquam incomitata virtus.^[3][7] Medieval British writers keep the sense unaccompanied, of people and of virtues.^[9]

Timeline

• 96–55 BC – Lucretius has incomitata funera.^[6][5]
• 116–27 BC – Varro uses it of girls going about unescorted.^[2][5]
• 43 BC–18 AD – Ovid uses it of virtue without outward goods.^[6][5]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Unaccompanied, unescorted, alone.^[2][6]
2. Figuratively, not attended by something.^[3][7]

Related words

• comes
• comitātus

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
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 e f Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ a b c d Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
8. ^ Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
9. ^ 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