membrana

Forms

membrāna f (genitive membrānae); first declension^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin membrum (“limb, part of the body”) + -āna.^[2][1][3] An ancient commentator on Lucan and Isidore explained the name from its covering the limbs.^[3] De Vaan traces membrum to Proto-Italic *memsro- and Proto-Indo-European *mēms-ro- (“body part, meaty part”), from a word for "meat";^[4] Latin, Celtic and Slavic share the derived sense "body part, membrane".^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

De Vaan finds it first in Varro,^[4] who uses it of the thin skin inside a pomegranate.^[2]

Semantic evolution

It is a thin skin in the body: Cicero says nature clothed the eyes with very thin membranes,^[2][5] Celsus speaks of the membrane of the brain,^[5] and Lucretius compares images that fly off things to membranes torn from their surface.^[2] It is used of the cast skin of a snake in Ovid,^[2] of a bladder in Pliny the Elder, of the wings of insects,^[2][5] and figuratively of a thin veneer, as when Seneca speaks of the evil that lies under the thin skin of dignity.^[2] Of plants it is a thin skin, as in Varro.^[2] Above all it is skin prepared for writing, parchment: Catullus has the red straps of a parchment roll, and Tibullus' corpus a yellow parchment cover for a book.^[2] Pliny the Elder also uses it of a thin slice.^[2] In Medieval Latin it is a charter,^[6] and Stelten gives "membrane, parchment, skin".^[7]

Timeline

• 116–27 BC – Varro of a thin skin in a pomegranate.^[2][4]
• 96–55 BC – Lucretius of skins torn from the surface of things.^[2]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero of the membranes of the eyes.^[2][5]
• 81/79–52/50 BC – Catullus of parchment.^[2]
• early 15th century – membrane appears in English as a term of anatomy.^[8]

Meanings

Noun

1. A membrane in the body; the cast skin of a snake, a slough; a bladder.^[2][5][1]
2. (figurative) A thin covering, veneer.^[2]
3. A thin skin of a plant.^[2][1]
4. Skin prepared for writing, parchment; a parchment cover for a book.^[2][5][1]
5. A thin slice.^[2]
6. (Medieval Latin) A charter.^[6]

Word family

• membrānāceus
• membrānārius
• membrāneus
• membrānula

Related words

• membrum
• English membrane

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ a b c d de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
5. ^ a b c d e f Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill
7. ^ Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
8. ^ Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com