Etymologically
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inumbro

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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [ɪˈnʊm.broː][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [iˈnum.bro][1]

Forms

inumbrō (present infinitive inumbrāre, perfect active inumbrāvī, supine inumbrātum); first conjugation[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin in- (“on”) + umbrō (“to shade”),[2][1] which the TLL derives from ⟨in⟩ and umbra (“shade, shadow”).[3] De Vaan notes that umbra is generally connected with Lithuanian ùnksna (“shade”) and reconstructed as a form with /nksr/, a cluster found in no other word; he finds no root etymology for it.[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

It first appears in Lucretius,[2][5] who describes men who hold their cups and shade their faces with garlands: inumbrant ora coronis.[2]

Semantic evolution

Lewis & Short call it mostly poetic and post-Augustan.[5] Lucretius also has the earth put in shadow, Virgil a couch shaded with a covering of leaves, and Pliny the Elder the forum shaded with awnings.[5] Tacitus uses it of evening coming on, inumbrante vespera, and Apuleius and Claudian of covering.[5] Varro has it, in an older technical sense, of marking out the shadows of a sundial.[5] Figuratively it is to put in the shade: Pliny the Younger writes that the dignity of the legates is overshadowed by the coming of the commander.[2][5] In the Digest the participle means apparent.[5]

Timeline

  • 96–55 BC – Lucretius, of shading faces with garlands.[2][6]
  • 116–27 BC – Varro, of marking out a sundial.[5][6]
  • 70–19 BC – Virgil, of a couch shaded with leaves.[5][6]
  • 98–115 AD – Tacitus, of evening coming on.[5][6]

Meanings

Verb

  1. To cast a shadow on, shade; to darken; to cover.[2][5][1]
  2. To mark out the shadows of (a sundial).[5]
  3. (figurative) To overshadow, put in the shade, obscure.[2][5][1]

Word family

  • inumbratio

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g 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. ^ 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 f g h i j k l m Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  6. ^ a b c d Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de