machaera

Forms

machaera f (genitive machaerae); first declension^[1] It is also spelled macchaera;^[2] the manuscripts of Plautus mostly write machera, and macera also occurs.^[3][4]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ancient Greek μάχαιρα (mákhaira, “large knife; short sword”).^[2][5][1][3] In Homer the Greek word means a large knife or butcher's knife, and later also a short sword or dagger.^[6] Beekes notes that it was traditionally connected with μάχομαι (mákhomai, “to fight”), which others find implausible, and that a Semitic etymology has been proposed with reservations; comparing μάγειρος (mágeiros, “cook”), he takes it to be a Pre-Greek word.^[6] Macrobius remarks that the early Romans used the Greek word for the sword.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Köbler and the TLL record it first in Ennius,^[7][3] whose Annales have succincti corda machaeris, “their hearts girt with swords”.^[3][8] Plautus uses it often of a soldier's sword.^[3][4]

Semantic evolution

The OLD defines it as a single-edged sword.^[2] Georges describes it as a slaughtering or hunting knife and a sword shaped like one, and the TLL notes that it sometimes means a knife rather than a sword.^[4][3] In Plautus a cook tells a soldier that his machaera is longer than the kitchen knife, and the word is also used jokingly for the penis in the Pseudolus.^[3][4] Seneca quotes a soldier who says he was run through not just with a club but with a machaera, and Tertullian speaks of the laws with their swords and gibbets.^[3] Gellius lists it among the names of weapons, and Isidore of Seville defines it as a long sword sharpened on one side.^[3] In the early Latin Bible translations it renders the Greek word throughout, where the Vulgate has gladius.^[3] Medieval writers in Britain use it for a sword or dagger, figuratively for the sword of God's word, and for a knife or hatchet.^[9]

Timeline

• 204–169 BC – Ennius uses it in the Annales.^[3][7]
• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus uses it often of a soldier's sword.^[3][7]
• 4 BC–65 AD – Seneca quotes a soldier speaking of being run through with a machaera.^[3][7]
• c. 560–636 AD – Isidore of Seville defines it as a long single-edged sword.^[3][7]
• Medieval Latin – British writers use it of a sword or dagger, and of a knife or hatchet.^[9]

Meanings

Noun

1. A single-edged sword.^[2][8]
2. A large knife, a butcher's or hunting knife.^[4][3]
3. (Ecclesiastical Latin) A knife, short sword.^[10]
4. (Medieval Latin) A sword or dagger; figuratively, the sword of God's word.^[9]
5. (Medieval Latin) A knife, hatchet.^[9]

Usage notes

Juvenal has Machaera as the name of an auctioneer.^[8]

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d 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 Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ a b c d e Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
5. ^ Saalfeld, Günther Alexander (1874), Index Graecorum vocabulorum in linguam latinam translatorum, Berlin: Weidmann
6. ^ a b Beekes, Robert S. P. (2010), Etymological Dictionary of Greek, with the assistance of Lucien van Beek, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 10, Leiden; Boston: Brill
7. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
8. ^ a b c Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ a b c d 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
10. ^ Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson