Etymologically
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insulatus

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Forms

īnsulātus (feminine īnsulāta, neuter īnsulātum); first/second-declension adjective[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin īnsula (“island”) + -ātus,[2][1] with the form and sense of a perfect passive participle of a verb *īnsulō that is not attested while Latin was spoken.[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

It first appears in Apuleius' De mundo, of regions once part of the mainland that the waves have turned into islands.[3][4][5]

Semantic evolution

Lewis & Short mark it as post-classical and cite it from Augustine's City of God as well.[6] Its sense stayed “made into an island”.[2][6] Through Italian isolato and French isolé it lies behind English isolated (1740),[7] and English insulate, “make into an island”, was taken from it in the 1530s.[7]

Timeline

  • c. 125–175 AD – Apuleius uses it of lands turned into islands.[3][4][5]
  • 354–430 AD – Augustine uses it.[6][5]
  • 1530s – English borrows it as insulate.[7]
  • 1740 – English isolated, ultimately from it through Italian and French, is first recorded.[7]

Meanings

Adjective

  1. Made into an island, insulated.[2][6][4]
  • insula
  • English insulate
  • English isolated

Usage notes

In British Medieval Latin the spelling insulatus is also a form of īnfulātus.[8]

References

  1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
  4. ^ a b c Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
  5. ^ a b c Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
  6. ^ a b c d Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ a b c d Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  8. ^ 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