ingenero

Forms

ingenerō (present infinitive ingenerāre, perfect active ingenerāvī, supine ingenerātum); first conjugation^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin in- (“in”) + generō (“to beget, produce”),^[2][3][1] and that verb is formed from genus (“birth, race, kind”), which goes back to Proto-Indo-European *ǵénh₁os, from the root *ǵenh₁- (“to beget”).^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLL finds it from Cicero, Catullus and Livy on.^[3] Cicero writes that nature implants in living beings a love for their offspring, and speaks of a thrift inborn in a family (ingenerāta familiae frūgālitās).^[4][5][2]

Semantic evolution

Its usual sense was to implant a quality or feeling: Cicero has the soul engendered by a god and physical defects implanted by a star,^[4][2] Livy a fellowship that nature has created,^[2][5] and Curtius a keenness for hunting that nature gave to hounds.^[2][6] Pliny the Elder asks where nature put the fierce voice of the gnat.^[2][3] In Catullus it means to renew a family by begetting children,^[6][5] and Columella uses it absolutely for planting.^[2][4]

Christian writers kept it: Ambrose speaks of forms of things implanted from the beginning.^[3] It lives on in French engendrer, Old Occitan engenrar and Catalan engendrar.^[3]

Timeline

• 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it of feelings and qualities implanted by nature.^[4][7]
• 81/79–52/50 BC – Catullus uses it of renewing a family by children.^[6][7]
• 59 BC–17 AD – Livy speaks of a fellowship engendered by nature.^[2][7]
• 1st century AD – Columella uses it of planting.^[2][7]
• 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder uses it of the gnat's voice.^[2][7]

Meanings

Verb

1. To engender, produce (children) in a family.^[2][5]
2. To plant (vegetables).^[2][4]
3. (figurative) To implant, instil (qualities, feelings); ingenerātus, inborn.^[2][4][6]

Related words

• generō
• genus
• ingenitus¹

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 d e Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ a b c d e f Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ a b c d Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
6. ^ a b c d Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
7. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de