indago
indago1 track, investigate
Pronunciation
Forms
indāgō (present infinitive indāgāre, perfect active indāgāvī, supine indāgātum); first conjugation[1]
Etymology
The verb is from Latin indāgō2 (“ring of hunters”), as the OLD has it;[2] the TLL derives it from that noun or from an adjective ⟨*ind-agus⟩, comparing pairs such as cālīgō beside its verb.[3]
Earliest recorded meaning
Plautus uses it in the Mercator, of whether a woman could be traced by asking what the buyer looked like, and in the Trinummus of finding out the facts.[2][3]
Semantic evolution
It is to track down animals, as a hunting dog does: Cicero has a dog born for tracking, and Columella says a good hunter takes as many beasts as he can in a great forest.[2][4] More generally it is to search out persons or things, and to find out facts by investigation.[2][4] Varro has a deponent indāgor.[2][4] Döderlein groups it with verbs of seeking that involve taking pains.[5] Stelten gives “investigate, inquire”.[6]
Timeline
- c. 250–184 BC – Plautus, of tracing a woman and finding out facts.[2][3][7]
- 116–27 BC – Varro has the deponent.[2][7]
- 81–43 BC – Cicero, of a tracking dog.[4][7]
Meanings
Verb
- To track down, hunt out (animals).[2][4][1]
- To search out, find by seeking; to investigate, find out.[2][4][1][6]
Word family
- indāgātiō
- indāgātor
- indāgātrīx
- indāgābilis
indago2 ring of hunters, encircling
Pronunciation
Forms
indāgō f (genitive indāginis); third declension[1]
Etymology
The noun is from Latin indu- (“in”) + agō (“to drive”), compared by the OLD with ambāgēs.[2][1] De Vaan traces agō to Proto-Indo-European *h₂eǵ-e/o- (“to drive, lead”), cognate with Ancient Greek ἄγω (ágō, “to drive, lead”) and Oscan acum (“to act”).[8]
Earliest recorded meaning
Lewis & Short find it mostly in post-Augustan writers; its first citation is Virgil's hunters circling the glades with a ring of nets.[4][2]
Semantic evolution
It is a ring of hunters or nets thrown round a wood so that game cannot escape,[2][4] and by extension the surrounding of enemies, as Florus has of ships caught as if in a net.[4][1] Ulpian uses it of the game taken in one such drive.[2] It also means a search or investigation, as Gellius has of the gluttons' hunt for delicacies far and wide.[2] In Late Latin it is a judicial inquiry,[1] and in Medieval Latin a game park or forest,[9][1] and in Hungary a border march.[1]
Timeline
- 70–19 BC – Virgil, of a hunters' ring.[2][4][7]
- c. 165 AD – Gellius, of a search for delicacies.[2][7]
Meanings
Noun
- A ring of hunters or nets round a wood; the game so caught.[2][4][1]
- A surrounding of enemies.[4][1]
- A tracking down, search, investigation.[2][1]
- (Late Latin, law) A judicial inquiry.[1]
- (Medieval Latin) A game park, forest; a border march.[9][1]
Related words
References
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
- ^ a b c Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
- ^ Döderlein, Ludwig (1874), Döderlein’s Hand-book of Latin Synonymes, tr. H. H. Arnold, Andover: W. F. Draper
- ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
- ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
- ^ 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 Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill