infidus

Forms

īnfīdus (feminine īnfīda, neuter īnfīdum); first/second-declension adjective^[1] A superlative occurs only in a conjecture in Pacuvius.^[2]

Etymology

It is from Latin in- + fīdus (“trustworthy”).^[2][1][3][4] De Vaan derives ⟨fīdus⟩ from Proto-Italic *feiþo- and Proto-Indo-European *bʰeidʰ-o- (“faithful”), the adjective of fīdō (“to trust”).^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

The OLD's earliest example is from Plautus: someone is reproached for having knowingly been faithless to one who was faithful.^[2]

Semantic evolution

Of people it is faithless, treacherous: Cicero asks whom someone had found faithful friends and whom faithless, and says nothing is stable that is not to be trusted.^[6] Livy uses it of a tribe suspected for many treacherous deeds.^[2] Of things it is unreliable, as Lucretius' snares of the treacherous sea, and of a treaty, as Livy's long untrustworthy pact with the Latins.^[2]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus of a faithless slave.^[2][4]
• 96–55 BC – Lucretius of the treacherous sea.^[2][4]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero of faithless friends.^[6][4]
• 59 BC–AD 17 – Livy of an untrustworthy treaty.^[2][4]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Of people, not to be trusted, faithless, treacherous, disloyal.^[2][6][1]
2. Of things, unreliable, unsafe; of a treaty, untrustworthy.^[2][1]

Related words

• fīdus
• īnfidēlis
• perfidus

Usage notes

Döderlein distinguishes īnfīdus, not to be trusted, from īnfidēlis, unfaithful, perfidus, treacherous in particular acts, and perfidiōsus, treacherous by character.^[7]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f 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. ^ 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 Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ Döderlein, Ludwig (1874), Döderlein’s Hand-book of Latin Synonymes, tr. H. H. Arnold, Andover: W. F. Draper