Etymologically
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inundo

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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [ɪˈnʊn.doː][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [iˈnun.do][1]

Forms

inundō (present infinitive inundāre, perfect active inundāvī, supine inundātum); first conjugation[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin in- + undō (“to rise in waves, surge”).[2][1] Priscian already derived it from unda (“wave”).[3] undō is made from that noun, which goes back to Proto-Italic *udōr and Proto-Indo-European *ud-ōr (“water”); de Vaan thinks the ā-stem and the sense "wave" may come from an old collective meaning "body of water".[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The OLD's first citation is Cicero's De natura deorum, of water flooding the earth.[2][5]

Semantic evolution

It is used of rivers or the sea flooding land, and absolutely of overflowing: Livy has the Tiber flooding the fields.[2][5] It also means to drench with a liquid, above all with blood: Virgil has ditches flooded with blood, and Curtius Rufus and Lactantius have plains drenched in gore.[2][5] Figuratively it is used of crowds that swarm over a place, as the armies with which Europe was flooded in Curtius Rufus and the Trojans pouring in again in Virgil,[2] and of feelings that overwhelm someone, as Petronius' Eumolpus flooded with resentment.[2] Stelten gives "overflow, flood" for Church Latin.[6]

Timeline

  • 81–43 BC – Cicero of water flooding the earth.[2][5]
  • 70–19 BC – Virgil of ditches flooded with blood and of Trojans swarming in.[2]
  • 59 BC–17 AD – Livy of the Tiber flooding the fields.[5]
  • 1st century AD – Curtius Rufus of armies flooding Europe.[2]
  • 1620s – inundate appears in English, from inundātus or as a back-formation from inundation.[7]

Meanings

Verb

  1. (of rivers or the sea) To flood, inundate (land); (intransitive) to overflow.[2][5][1]
  2. (figurative) To overwhelm, fill (with a feeling).[2]
  3. To drench, flood (with blood or another liquid); (intransitive) to be drenched.[2][5]
  4. To crowd or swarm over;[2] (intransitive) to swarm in.[2]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n 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 Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  6. ^ Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
  7. ^ Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com