Etymologically
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mensuro

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Forms

mēnsūrō (present infinitive mēnsūrāre, perfect active mēnsūrāvī, supine mēnsūrātum); first conjugation[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin mēnsūra (“measure”),[2][3][4][5][1] which is formed from mētior (“to measure”) with the suffix -tūra.[1] The chain goes back to Proto-Indo-European *meh₁-.[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Lewis & Short call it post-classical.[2] An early instance is in Vegetius' handbook on warfare, where a ditch is measured (“fossa mensuratur”), meaning to measure something's size.[2][4][6]

Semantic evolution

Late Latin used it of measuring land boundaries and lengths, as in the Vulgate's Ezekiel, and also figuratively, of weighing up one's resources, in Corippus.[2][4] In Medieval Latin it was a common word for measuring objects and quantities, and especially for surveying and marking out land; it could also be intransitive, “to measure, have such dimensions”.[7][8] Writers on music used it of the length of notes.[9]

It lived on in the Romance languages, as Italian misurare, French mesurer and Catalan mesurar,[1] and through Old French it gave English measure.[10]

Timeline

  • c. 400 AD – Vegetius uses it of measuring a ditch.[2][4][11]
  • 390–406 AD – The Vulgate uses it of measuring a length.[2][11]
  • 6th century AD – Corippus uses it figuratively, “to estimate”.[2][4][11]
  • 950 – A cartulary has the spelling mesuro.[7]
  • 13th century – A treatise on music uses it of note values.[9]
  • early 14th century – English borrows its Old French descendant as mesuren, “measure”.[10]

Meanings

Verb

  1. To measure.[2][3][4][6]
  2. (figurative) To estimate, weigh up.[2][4][1]
  3. (Medieval Latin) To mark out or survey land.[7][8]
  4. (Medieval Latin, intransitive) To measure, have certain dimensions.[7]
  5. (Medieval Latin, music) To measure note values.[9]

Word family

  • mēnsūrātiō
  • mēnsūrātor
  • mēnsūrābilis
  • mēnsūrālis

Usage notes

Medieval documents also spell it mesuro and mencsuro.[7]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  3. ^ a b Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
  4. ^ a b c d e f g Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
  5. ^ Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
  6. ^ a b Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
  7. ^ a b c d e Novum Glossarium Mediae Latinitatis ab anno DCCC usque ad annum MCC (1957–), Copenhagen / Geneva / Paris: Union Académique Internationale; IRHT
  8. ^ a b Lexicon mediae et infimae Latinitatis Polonorum (1953–), Kraków: Instytut Języka Polskiego PAN; electronic ed. elexicon.scriptores.pl
  9. ^ a b c Lexicon musicum Latinum medii aevi (1992–), Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften; online ed. Wörterbuchnetz
  10. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  11. ^ a b c Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de