lucifer

Forms

lūcifer (feminine lūcifera, neuter lūciferum); first/second-declension adjective^[1][2] As a noun, Lūcifer, genitive Lūciferī, masculine, usually capitalised.^[3][4]

Etymology

It is from Latin lūx (“light”) + -fer (“bearing”),^[2][3][5] and Wiktionary takes it as a calque of Ancient Greek Φωσφόρος (Phōsphóros).^[1] Cicero says that the star of Venus called ⟨Phosphoros⟩ in Greek is called ⟨Lucifer⟩ in Latin when it rises before the sun.^[3] lūx goes back to Proto-Indo-European *leuk- (“light”),^[6] and the second part to ferō (“to carry”).^[2][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

The OLD and Köbler record it first in Accius,^[2][7] who calls lightning a light-bringing torch (lucifera lampade).^[2]

Semantic evolution

As an adjective it means “bringing light”: Lucretius uses it of the lit part of the moon and Ovid of the horses of the Moon,^[3][4] and Cicero mentions Diana as Lucifera, invoked in childbirth.^[3] The masculine became the name of the morning star, the planet Venus seen before sunrise, while the evening star was Hesperus;^[3][2] in myth Lucifer was the son of Aurora and Cephalus and the father of Ceyx.^[2][3] Poets used it for “morning” or “day”, so that paucis Luciferis meant “in a few days”.^[2][3]

Isaiah's taunt to the king of Babylon, quomodo cecidisti de caelo, Lucifer (“how you have fallen from heaven, morning star”), was read of the devil's fall, as Bede explains,^[8] and so the Church Fathers used the name of Satan, the fallen bearer of light.^[9] Prudentius gives the adjective the sense “bringing salvation”,^[3][4] and medieval writers in Britain applied the noun to bishops and saints and to God or Christ.^[8] Old English took the word over for Satan and for the morning star.^[10]

Timeline

• 170–c. 90 BC – Accius uses the adjective of lightning.^[2][7]
• 116–27 BC – Varro names the morning star Lucifer and the evening star Hesperus.^[3][4][7]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero gives it as the Latin for the Greek Phosphoros.^[3][7]
• 57/46–12 BC – Propertius uses the plural for “days”.^[2][3][7]
• 43 BC–18 AD – Ovid makes Lucifer the father of Ceyx.^[2][3][7]
• 348/49–c. 413 AD – Prudentius uses the adjective for “bringing salvation”.^[3][4][7]
• c. 1169 – Peter of Blois calls Lucifer the first son of pride, a bearer of darkness rather than light.^[8]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Light-bringing, light-bearing.^[2][3]
2. (figurative, Late Latin) Bringing salvation.^[3][4]

Noun

1. The morning star, the planet Venus.^[2][3]
2. (mythology) Lucifer, son of Aurora and Cephalus and father of Ceyx.^[2][3]
3. (poetic) Morning, day.^[2][3]
4. (Ecclesiastical Latin) Lucifer, the fallen angel, Satan.^[9][8]
5. (Ecclesiastical Latin) A bringer of light, said of a saint or of God or Christ.^[8]

Related words

• English Lucifer
• English luciferous

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 o Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
4. ^ a b c d e f Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
5. ^ Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
6. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
7. ^ a b c d e f g Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
8. ^ a b c d e 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
9. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
10. ^ Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com