infatuatio

Forms

īnfatuātiō f (genitive īnfatuātiōnis); third declension^[1][2]

Etymology

It is formed from Latin īnfatuō + -tiō, from the verb meaning “to make a fool of”.^[3][4][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Its first record is a Latin commentary on Job ascribed to Origen, which speaks of animarum infatuatio atque cordium scandalum (“the befooling of souls and the stumbling of hearts”); the TLL explains it there as deception.^[3][5] Lewis & Short attribute the passage to Hilary and Gaffiot to Jerome.^[4][2]

Semantic evolution

Gaffiot and Conte render it as extravagance or folly,^[2][5] and Du Cange explains it as foolishness, quoting a late medieval sermon.^[6] In the Latin of Bohemia it meant madness, a derangement of the mind,^[7] and in that of Poland both a loss of savour, said of the salt of the Gospel (Matthew 5:13), and delusion or stupidity.^[8]

English infatuation (1640s) comes from infatuate, from French infatuation or from the Late Latin noun.^[9]

Timeline

• 1640s – English infatuation appears.^[9]

Meanings

Noun

1. (Late Latin) Deception, befooling.^[3][1]
2. Folly, extravagance.^[2][5][6]
3. (Medieval Latin) Madness, derangement of mind.^[7][8]
4. (Medieval Latin, figurative) Loss of savour.^[8]

Related words

• fatuus
• English infatuation

References

1. ^ a b c Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
2. ^ a b c d Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
3. ^ a b c Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ a b Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ a b c Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
6. ^ a b du Cange, Charles du Fresne, et al. (1883–1887), Glossarium mediae et infimae latinitatis, augmented ed. by Léopold Favre, Niort: L. Favre
7. ^ a b Latinitatis medii aevi lexicon Bohemorum / Slovník středověké latiny v českých zemích (1977–), Prague: Academia; electronic version, Institute of Philosophy of the Czech Academy of Sciences
8. ^ a b c Lexicon mediae et infimae Latinitatis Polonorum (1953–), Kraków: Instytut Języka Polskiego PAN; electronic ed. elexicon.scriptores.pl
9. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com