inefficax

Forms

inefficāx (genitive inefficācis); third-declension one-termination adjective^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin in- (“not”) + efficāx (“effective”).^[2][3][1] The adjective efficāx goes back to ex- and faciō (“to make, do”),^[4][1] which de Vaan traces to Proto-Italic *fak-i- and to Proto-Indo-European *dʰh₁-k- (“to make”), from *dʰeh₁- (“to put”).^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLL finds it from Seneca's philosophical works on;^[3][4] in the De ira he speaks of a voice that cannot produce words (vox inefficax verborum).^[6]

Semantic evolution

Lewis and Short call it post-Augustan.^[6] It means achieving nothing, ineffectual or useless: Seneca applies it to reasoning and to the gods.^[2][6] Pliny the Elder uses the comparative of remedies that are less potent than others,^[2] and the jurists Africanus and Ulpian use it of a legacy or a decision that is invalid.^[2] An inscription has the superlative of very weak parents.^[6] The adverb inefficāciter, “ineffectually”, appears in the Digest, the Code of Justinian and Symmachus.^[6] In Ecclesiastical Latin it means ineffective or inefficient.^[7] Köbler lists medieval uses, among them Albertus Magnus.^[4]

Timeline

• 4 BC–65 AD – Seneca uses it of a voice and of reasoning that achieve nothing.^[6][4]
• 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder uses it of weak remedies.^[2][4]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Achieving nothing, ineffectual, useless, unavailing.^[2][6]
2. Of remedies, not potent, not efficacious.^[2]
3. (law) Invalid, inoperative.^[2]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
5. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
6. ^ a b c d e f g Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson