luto

Forms

lutō (present infinitive lutāre, perfect active lutāvī, supine lutātum); first conjugation, transitive.^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin lutum² (“mud, clay”) + -ō.^[1][2] De Vaan lists it among the derivatives of lutum², which goes back to Proto-Italic *luto- and Proto-Indo-European *l(H)u-to- (“dirt”).^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Cato (234–149 BC) is the first to use it,^[3][4] in his instructions for coating a granary with thick mud made with olive lees, after which everything “quod lutaveris” (“that you have daubed”) is to be sprinkled with lees.^[2]

Semantic evolution

Calpurnius Siculus writes of the swallow that will daub its nest on its return,^[5][2] and Lampridius of inscriptions on statues smeared with mud.^[5] By extension it meant to smear with any similar substance: Martial uses it of wrestlers' ointment on shining hair, and Persius of a man daubed with thick perfumes.^[5][1] The TLL traces Old Italian lotare and Old French luer to it.^[2]

Timeline

• 234–149 BC – Cato uses it of coating a granary with mud.^[2][4]
• second third of the 1st century AD – Calpurnius Siculus uses it of a swallow daubing its nest.^[5][4]
• 34–62 AD – Persius uses it of a man smeared with perfumes.^[5][4]
• 40–102/103 AD – Martial uses it of ointment smeared on hair.^[5][4]

Meanings

Verb

1. To daub or coat with mud or clay.^[1][5][6]
2. (transferred) To smear or plaster with any similar substance.^[1][5]

Word family

• dēlutō

Related words

• lutum²
• lutitō

Usage notes

A different verb lūtō “to pay”, which Varro uses once in a passage quoted by Nonius, is explained as a frequentative of luō, standing for luitō;^[5][7] the TLL takes it as a play on words with lutō “daub”.^[2]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
2. ^ a b c d e f Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
3. ^ 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
4. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
7. ^ Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.