Etymologically
Log in

lacteo

This is the current revision of this entry, as edited by bogdan on 20 October 2026 at 09:30. This address is a permanent link to this version.
Changes in this edit History

Forms

lacteō (present infinitive lactēre); second conjugation, no perfect or supine stems[1] It is used almost only in the present participle lactēns.[2][3]

Etymology

It is from Latin lac (“milk”) + -eō;[4][1] the TLL takes it as a back-formation from its present participle.[3] De Vaan traces lac to Proto-Italic *(g)lagt- and Proto-Indo-European *glg-t- (“milk”).[5] Cognate with Ancient Greek γάλα (gála, “milk”).[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Cicero has it of Romulus as a little suckling child gaping at the wolf's teats, parvus atque lactens, uberibus lupinis inhians.[2]

Semantic evolution

It means to suck milk, to be a suckling: Cicero also has the infant Jupiter suckling and a suckling victim for sacrifice,[2] and Ovid a suckling calf and sucklings in general.[2] Ovid compares the young spring to a suckling child.[2] It also means to be full of milk or juice, to be milky or sappy:[4] Virgil has crops swelling milky on the green stalk, Pliny the Elder a milky lettuce, and Palladius young greens full of sap.[2] Celsus uses the neuter plural lactentia as a noun, milk foods.[2] The TLL notes that ordinary speech tended to avoid the verb.[3] In Church Latin it is to suck, to be a suckling.[6]

Timeline

  • 81–43 BC – Cicero, of Romulus as a suckling.[2][7]
  • 70–19 BC – Virgil, of milky crops.[2][7]
  • 43 BC–18 AD – Ovid, of a suckling calf.[2][7]
  • 14–37 AD – Celsus, lactentia, milk foods.[2][7]

Meanings

Verb

  1. To suck milk, to be a suckling.[2][1][6]
  2. To be full of milk or juice, to be milky or sappy.[4][2][1]

Word family

  • collacteus
  • lactēscō

References

  1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ 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
  3. ^ a b c Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
  4. ^ a b c Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  5. ^ a b 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 Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
  7. ^ a b c d Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de