integumentum

Forms

integumentum n (genitive integumentī); second declension^[1] The older spelling integimentum survives as a manuscript reading, for example in Plautus.^[2]

Etymology

It is from Latin integō (“to cover over”) + -mentum.^[3][2][1] The verb is a compound of in- and tegō (“to cover”),^[4] which goes back to Proto-Indo-European *(s)teg-e/o- (“to cover”).^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is found from Plautus on,^[6][2] meaning a protection or shield: in the Bacchides a parasite calls himself the protection of that man's body (illius sum integumentum corporis).^[2][3]

Semantic evolution

It means a protective covering or guard,^[3] and then any cover or wrapping: Livy explains that the “linen legion” was named from the linen covering of the enclosure in which the consecrated nobles stood.^[3][2] Figuratively it is a means of concealment, as when Cicero says he saw someone's gifts through certain wrappings and coverings, or speaks of the coverings of misdeeds.^[3][2] Festus calls the eyebrow the covering of the eye, and Augustine uses it of the husks of grain.^[2]

British Medieval Latin keeps the senses of an outer covering or husk and of a means of concealment, and adds that of an obscure expression or allegory: Bernard's commentary on the Aeneid defines integumentum as a kind of exposition that wraps the truth in a fictitious narrative.^[7] English borrowed it as integument in the 1610s, with the biological sense of a skin or shell from the 1660s.^[4]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus uses it for a protection.^[2][6]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it figuratively for a covering that conceals.^[3][6]
• 59 BC–17 AD – Livy uses it of the covering of a sacred enclosure.^[3][6]
• first third of the 8th century – Bede uses it for the husks of grain.^[7][6]
• 1610s – English borrows it as integument.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. A protective covering, shield, guard.^[3][8]
2. A cover, wrapping; a means of concealment.^[3][2]
3. (Medieval Latin) A husk; an obscure expression, an allegory.^[7]

Related words

• tegumentum
• English integument

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b c Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
6. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
7. ^ a b c 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
8. ^ Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press