Etymologically
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lippus

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Forms

lippus (feminine lippa, neuter lippum); first/second-declension adjective[1] Manuscripts also spell it lyppus and lipus.[2]

Etymology

It is perhaps inherited from Proto-Italic *l(e)ipo-, from Proto-Indo-European *l(e)ip-o- (“sticky, fat”), with the doubled stop of many Latin adjectives for physical defects; de Vaan compares Ancient Greek λίπος (lípos, “fat”) but finds the link in meaning not compelling.[3] The OLD compares Sanskrit लिम्पति (limpáti, “smears”) and Ancient Greek ἀλείφω (aleíphō, “to anoint”).[4] The TLL notes that this comparison has to assume a popular doubling of the consonant and a shifted sense.[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

De Vaan and Köbler date it from Plautus,[3][5] in whose Miles Gloriosus someone asks whether he looks bleary-eyed.[6]

Semantic evolution

It describes a person with watery or inflamed eyes, and the eyes themselves: in the Persa someone says his master cannot keep his hands off him any more than a bleary eye can be left alone.[4][6] Vitruvius uses it of eyes, and Martial of an eye socket.[4] Wiktionary also gives half-blind, and figuratively blind to one's own faults.[1] The TLL records descendants in Langobardic and Catalan.[2]

Timeline

  • c. 250–184 BC – Plautus of bleary eyes.[4][6][3][5]
  • c. 84–c. 25 BC – Vitruvius.[4][5]
  • 40–102/103 AD – Martial of an eye socket.[4][5]

Meanings

Adjective

  1. Having watery, bleary or inflamed eyes; of the eyes, bleary.[4][6][1]
  2. Half-blind, purblind.[1]
  3. (figurative) Blind to one's own faults.[1]

Word family

  • lippitūdō
  • lippulus
  • lippōsus
  • lippēscō
  • lippidus
  • lippiō

References

  1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
  3. ^ a b c de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
  4. ^ a b c d e f g Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  5. ^ a b c d 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