infelicitas

Forms

īnfēlīcitās f (genitive īnfēlīcitātis); third declension^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin īnfēlīx (“unlucky”) + -tās.^[2][1][3] That adjective is in- (“not”) with fēlīx (“lucky”), which de Vaan explains as first “suckling, with young”, then “fruitful”, “fortunate”, going back to Proto-Italic *fēl(w)ī- (“suckling”) and Proto-Indo-European *dʰeh₁-l(u)-i-.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

De Vaan and Köbler date it from Terence,^[4][3] where a man cries out at his bad luck.^[2]

Semantic evolution

It is misfortune or ill luck, and an instance of it;^[2][5] Lewis & Short call it rare but classical.^[2][5] Cicero uses it of lack of success, saying that soothsayers are not so unlucky that nothing they foretell ever happens by chance, and it is also infelicity of style.^[2] Seneca uses it of an unhappy condition, wretchedness.^[2] The TLL notes that Christian writers use mea īnfēlīcitās of the speaker himself.^[6] Church Latin glosses it unhappiness, wretchedness.^[7]

Timeline

• 190–159 BC – Terence of bad luck.^[2][4][3]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero of the soothsayers' failure.^[2][5]
• 4 BC–65 AD – Seneca of wretchedness.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. Misfortune, ill luck.^[2][5][1]
2. Unhappy condition, wretchedness.^[2][7]
3. Lack of success;^[2] (of style) infelicity.^[2]

Related words

• īnfēlīx
• fēlīcitās

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