Etymologically
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inexplebilis

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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [ɪ.nɛkˈspɫeː.bɪ.lɪs][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [i.nekˈsplɛː.bi.lis][1]

Forms

inexplēbilis (neuter inexplēbile); third-declension two-termination adjective[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin in- (“not”) + expleō (“to fill up, satisfy”) + -bilis (“-able”).[2][1] Köbler takes it through the adjective explēbilis (“that can be filled”), and analyses the verb as ⟨ex-⟩ with a simple verb “to fill” not attested on its own.[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLL and Köbler date it from Cicero,[4][3] who defines craving as libīdō inexplēbilis, an insatiable desire.[2]

Semantic evolution

Lewis & Short call it classical.[5] It is used of people and animals that cannot be filled, as of a creature insatiable in drinking in Pliny, a stomach in Seneca, and the jaws of the people in Cicero,[5] and of passions that can never be satisfied: Cicero's cupiditās, Florus' hunger for honours.[2][5] With a genitive it means insatiable of something: Livy calls a man inexplēbilis virtūtis vēraeque laudis.[5] In Apuleius it is used of philosophy's mixing bowl, of which one cannot have enough.[2] Ancient glossaries explain it as īnsatiābilis.[4] In Ecclesiastical Latin it means insatiable and extraordinary.[6]

Timeline

  • 81–43 BC – Cicero, of insatiable desire.[2][4][3]
  • 59 BC–17 AD – Livy, with a genitive.[5][3]
  • 4 BC–65 AD – Seneca, of a stomach and of the mind.[2][5][3]
  • c. 125–175 AD – Apuleius, of something one cannot have enough of.[2][3]

Meanings

Adjective

  1. That cannot be filled or sated, insatiable (of people and animals).[2][5][1]
  2. Impossible to satisfy (of passions and appetites).[2][5]
  3. Of which one cannot have enough.[2]
  4. (Ecclesiastical Latin) Extraordinary.[6]

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 Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c d e f Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
  4. ^ a b c Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  6. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson