insula

Pronunciation

• IPA (Classical): [ˈĩː.sʊ.ɫa]^[1]
• IPA (Ecclesiastical): [ˈin.su.la]^[1]

Forms

īnsula f (genitive īnsulae); first declension^[1]

Etymology

The origin is disputed.^[2][3] An old explanation takes it from in and salum “the sea”, “what is in the sea”; de Vaan finds this possible in form but a poor description of an island, especially as Indo-European words for “island” seem to have meant river islands.^[2][1] He suggests a loanword from an unknown language, the same one that may have given the Celtic and Greek words, which also have /n/ and /s/.^[2] The TLL rejects that derivation and prefers a borrowing of Ancient Greek νῆσος (nêsos, “island”) through an Oscan form.^[3]

Compare Old Irish inis (“island”), Welsh ynys (“island”) and νῆσος.^[2][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is found from Naevius onwards,^[2][4] who tells how a Roman army crossed to Malta and burned the whole island.^[5]

Semantic evolution

It meant an island, whether in the sea, a lake or a river, and Insula was the name of a quarter of Syracuse.^[5][6] In Rome it was also a large building let out in flats, a tenement block, as when Cicero writes that Clodius' block was up for sale.^[5][7] Christian writers used it for a temple.^[7]

In Medieval Latin it could also mean a peninsula^[8] and the nave of a church,^[4] and as a place name it stands for Lille and other towns.^[9] It survives as Italian isola, French île, Spanish isla and Portuguese ilha.^[1] English isle came through Old French in the late 13th century, and peninsula is paeninsula, “almost an island”.^[10]

Timeline

• c. 235–200 BC – Naevius uses it of Malta.^[5][4]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it for a block of flats.^[5][4]
• late 13th century – English isle comes through Old French.^[10]
• 1530s – English takes peninsula and insulate from Latin.^[10]

Meanings

Noun

1. An island.^[5][6]
2. A block of flats, tenement building.^[5][1]
3. (Ecclesiastical Latin) A temple.^[7]
4. (Medieval Latin) A peninsula.^[8]
5. (Medieval Latin) The nave of a church.^[4]

Word family

• īnsulānus
• īnsulāris
• īnsulārius
• īnsulātus
• īnsulōsus
• paenīnsula
• īnsulēnsis
• īnsulō

Related words

• English isle
• English peninsula
• English insulate
• English isolate

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
3. ^ a b 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. ^ a b c d e f g Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ a b c Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
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. ^ Graesse, J. G. Th., Friedrich Benedict, and Ernst Plechl (1909), Orbis Latinus: Lexikon lateinischer geographischer Namen, 2nd ed., Berlin: R. C. Schmidt
10. ^ a b c Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com