insomnis

Forms

īnsomnis (neuter īnsomne); third-declension two-termination adjective^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin in- (“not”) + somnus (“sleep”) + -is.^[2][1][3] somnus goes back to Proto-Italic *swopno- and Proto-Indo-European *suépno- (“sleep”), with cognates such as Sanskrit स्वप्न (svápna-, “sleep, dream”) and Ancient Greek ὕπνος (húpnos, “sleep”).^[4] Compare exsomnis.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

De Vaan and Köbler record it from Cato,^[4][5] but the TLL treats the reading in Cato as a doubtful conjecture and finds it securely from Virgil and Horace on.^[3] It means sleepless.^[2]

Semantic evolution

It means unsleeping, wakeful, and perhaps also unable to sleep;^[2][6] Lewis and Short call it poetic and post-Augustan.^[2][6] Horace uses it of Gyges spending sleepless nights, Ovid of a dragon, and Tacitus contrasts men who were insomnes magis quam pervigiles, sleepless rather than watchful.^[6][3] Of a night or of care it means without sleep: Virgil has guards spending a sleepless night at play.^[2]

In Ecclesiastical Latin it keeps the sense sleepless,^[7] and in Medieval Latin from Britain it is used of people and of nights, as when Bede writes of brethren spending the night sleepless in prayer and psalms.^[8]

Timeline

• 70–19 BC – Virgil uses it of a sleepless night.^[2][3][5]
• 65–8 BC – Horace uses it of Gyges' sleepless nights.^[6][3][5]
• 43 BC–18 AD – Ovid uses it of a dragon.^[6][5]
• 98–115 AD – Tacitus has insomnes magis quam pervigiles.^[6][5]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Sleepless, wakeful, unsleeping; unable to sleep.^[2][6][1][7]
2. (of a night, of care) Without sleep.^[2][8]

Word family

• īnsomnia
• īnsomnietās

Related words

• somnus
• exsomnis
• somnium

Usage notes

Döderlein contrasts it with vigil, which means awake by choice and with attention;^[9] insomnis and exsomnis mean only sleepless, and insomnis is one who cannot sleep, exsomnis one who will not.^[9]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f 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 Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
6. ^ a b c d e f g Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
8. ^ a b Latham, R. E., D. R. Howlett, R. K. Ashdowne, et al. (1975–2013), Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources, London: British Academy / Oxford University Press
9. ^ a b Döderlein, Ludwig (1874), Döderlein’s Hand-book of Latin Synonymes, tr. H. H. Arnold, Andover: W. F. Draper