Etymologically
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incompositus

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Forms

incompositus (feminine incomposita, neuter incompositum, adverb incompositē); first/second-declension adjective[1] It is also spelled inconpositus.[2]

Etymology

It is from Latin in- (“not”) + compositus (“put together, orderly”).[2][3][1] The adjective is the perfect participle of compōnō (“to put together”), a compound of com- and pōnō (“to put”).[2][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLL records it from Virgil, Horace and Livy on.[3] In the Georgics a countryman, his temples wreathed in oak, makes clumsy movements in honour of Ceres: det motus incompositos.[2][3]

Semantic evolution

Its main sense is badly put together or ill arranged, and above all of speech and verse:[2] Horace says Lucilius' verses run on an irregular foot, and Quintilian calls Aeschylus rough and unpolished in most things.[4][3] Seneca uses it in a good sense: a speech devoted to truth should be artless and simple.[2][3] Of troops it means not in formation, as in Livy's column marching in disorder.[2][4] Pliny the Younger has a gymnasium that is badly laid out.[2]

In later Latin it also meant not compound, simple, as in Ambrose and Boethius.[4][5] Medieval Latin used it for what is imperfect or unfinished and for undisciplined or dissolute people,[5] and in the laws for a person for whose death no wergild is paid.[5]

Timeline

  • 70–19 BC – Virgil, of clumsy dance movements.[2][3][6]
  • 65–8 BC – Horace, of Lucilius' irregular verse.[4][3][6]
  • 59 BC–17 AD – Livy, of a column of troops out of formation.[2][4][6]
  • c. 35–95/96 AD – Quintilian, of rough and unpolished style.[4][6]
  • 769–813 – Frankish capitularies use it.[6]

Meanings

Adjective

  1. Badly put together, ill arranged, irregular, especially of speech or writing.[2][4][1]
  2. Of movements: clumsy, awkward.[2][1]
  3. Unaffected, artless.[2]
  4. Of troops: not in formation, disorderly.[2][4]
  5. (Late Latin) Not compound, simple.[4][5]
  6. (Medieval Latin) Imperfect, unfinished; of persons, undisciplined.[5]
  7. (Medieval Latin, law) Of a person for whose death no wergild is paid.[5]

Usage notes

The adverb incompositē, without order, is used by Livy and of speech by Quintilian.[4]

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 l m n Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c d e f g Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  5. ^ a b c d e f Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill
  6. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de