indebitus

Forms

indēbitus (feminine indēbita, neuter indēbitum, adverb indēbitē or indēbitō); first/second-declension adjective^[1]

Etymology

It is formed from Latin in- (“not”) + dēbitus (“owed”), the perfect participle of dēbeō (“to owe”).^[2][3][1] De Vaan explains the verb as contracted from *dēhabeō (“I withhold”), a compound of habeō.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is first found in Virgil's Aeneid (6.66), in a request for kingdoms that are “not undue” to his fates: non indebita posco regna meis fatis.^[2][5][3]

Semantic evolution

In poetry it was said of rewards and favours that are not owed, Ovid writing of praemia “not undue”.^[2][5] In prose the TLL finds it from Quintilian on;^[3] in legal Latin it was used of sums of money not owed, and the neuter indēbitum became a noun for “what is not owed”, as in the Digest's indebitum solvere “to pay what is not owed”.^[5] Augustine speaks of exacting what is not owed.^[6] Medieval British writers also used it of a person or institution not in debt.^[7]

Timeline

• 70–19 BC – Virgil uses non indebita of kingdoms not denied by fate.^[2][8]
• 43 BC–18 AD – Ovid uses it of rewards not owed.^[2][8]
• before 223 AD – Ulpian uses it of interest paid though not owed.^[2][8]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Not owed, not due.^[2][5]
2. (law) Of sums of money: not owed.^[2]
3. Of rewards and favours: not undeserved, not unfitting.^[2][5]
4. (substantive, neuter) indēbitum: what is not owed.^[5][6]
5. (Medieval Latin) Of a person or institution: not in debt.^[7]

Word family

• indēbitum

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 Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
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 e f Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
7. ^ a b 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
8. ^ a b c Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de