mel

Forms

mel n (genitive mellis); third declension^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Proto-Italic *meli, inherited from Proto-Indo-European *mélit (“honey”).^[2][3] Cognate with Old Irish mil (“honey”), Welsh mel (“honey”), Hittite militt- (“honey”), Ancient Greek μέλι (méli, “honey”) (genitive ⟨μέλιτος⟩) and Gothic 𐌼𐌹𐌻𐌹𐌸 (miliþ, “honey”).^[2][4] The geminate of the genitive ⟨mellis⟩ is disputed: Leumann took ⟨mell-⟩ as a secondary form after fel (“bile”), genitive ⟨fellis⟩, and Sihler derives it from an old paradigm with a stem ending in a dental.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

Plautus, Mercator: a resin from Egypt is to be swallowed ex melle, “in honey”.^[4][3]

Semantic evolution

Besides the food it is honey as a preservative, as Columella says every kind of fruit can be kept in it, and the type of sweetness: Plautus' melle dulcī dulcior, “sweeter than sweet honey”.^[4] Figuratively it is sweetness or charm, and in Plautus already a term of endearment, mel meum, “my honey”.^[4][1] Pliny the Elder uses it of honey-like substances made by other insects or by plants.^[4]

Church Latin glosses it “honey”.^[5] It lived on into the Middle Ages in laws, charters and glosses.^[3]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus of honey, as a type of sweetness and as an endearment.^[4][3]
• 1st century AD – Columella of honey as a preservative.^[4][3]
• 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder of honey-like substances.^[4][3]

Meanings

Noun

1. Honey.^[4][1][5]
2. (figuratively) Sweetness, pleasantness.^[4][1]
3. (term of endearment) Sweet, darling.^[4][1]
4. A honey-like substance made by insects other than bees or by plants.^[4]

Word family

• melculum
• mella
• mellārius
• mellātiō
• melleus
• melliculus
• mellifer
• mellifex
• mellificium
• mellificō
• mellificus
• mellifluēns

Related words

• melina
• mellārium
• melliculum
• mellilla
• mellītulus
• mulsus

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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
3. ^ a b c d e f Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson