inno

Forms

innō (present infinitive innāre, perfect active innāvī, supine innātum); first conjugation^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin in- + nō (“to swim”).^[2][3] De Vaan traces nō to Proto-Italic *(s)nāje/o- and Proto-Indo-European *(s)neh₂- (“to swim, float”);^[4] cognate with Ancient Greek νήχω (nḗkhō, “to swim”) and Old Irish snaïd (“swims”).^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Cicero's De natura deorum speaks of sea beasts, some under water, some floating and swimming.^[2][5]

Semantic evolution

It is to swim in or on, with a dative, an ablative or, in poetry, an accusative: Virgil's nymphs swim side by side, Cloelia swims the river, and animals swim rapid streams.^[2][6] Columella will teach boys to swim in rivers, and Suetonius has sea beasts swimming in Nero's mock sea fight.^[6][2] Of boats it is to float or sail: Virgil has painted keels floating on the river, Livy rough hulls built only to float, and Tacitus a fleet made lighter to sail the shallows;^[2] Seneca reports Thales' view that the earth floats on water.^[2] Virgil also uses it of a passenger crossing the Stygian lakes.^[2][5] Horace has the Liris flowing over the shores of Marica.^[2][5]

Timeline

• 81–43 BC – Cicero, of swimming sea beasts.^[2][7]
• 70–19 BC – Virgil, of swimming nymphs and floating keels.^[2][7]
• 65–8 BC – Horace, of a river flowing over its shores.^[2][7]
• 98–115 AD – Tacitus, of a fleet in shallow water.^[2][7]

Meanings

Verb

1. To swim in or on.^[2][5][1]
2. Of boats, to float, sail on; to sail across.^[2][6][1]
3. Of water, to flow over, wash.^[2][5]

Word family

• innābilis

Related words

• nō
• natō
• innatō

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 n o 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 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 e Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b c Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
7. ^ a b c d Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de