metreta

Pronunciation

• Classical: [mɛˈtreː.ta]^[1]
• Ecclesiastical: [meˈtrɛː.ta]^[1]

Forms

metrēta f (genitive metrētae); first declension^[1] It is masculine, as in Greek, in the jurist Gaius.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ancient Greek μετρητής (metrētḗs),^[2][4][5] literally a “measurer”,^[6] from μετρέω (metréō, “to measure”), from μέτρον (métron, “measure”).^[5] Köbler compares Proto-Indo-European *meh₁- (“to measure”).^[5][7]

Augustine already explained that the measure took its name from measuring, since that is the Greek word for a measure.^[8]

Earliest recorded meaning

Plautus has it first, in the prologue of the Mercator, where a ship that carried three hundred metrētae is sold, the word measuring its burden.^[4][6][5]

Semantic evolution

It was the Athenian liquid measure of twelve congiī, about nine English gallons.^[4][2] By extension it named a jar or cask of that size: Cato uses it of a new oil jar, Columella of oil jars, and Juvenal of a jar that hits someone's head in the street.^[4][6] The jurist Gaius uses it too,^[6] and Augustine comments on it in his tractates on the Gospel of John.^[8]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus uses it as a measure of a ship's capacity.^[4][6][5]
• 234–149 BC – Cato uses it for an oil jar.^[4][5]
• 1st century AD – Columella measures liquid pitch by the metrēta.^[4][5]
• c. 67–c. 127 AD – Juvenal mentions a metrēta carried in the street.^[4][5]
• 140–180 AD – The jurist Gaius uses it as a masculine.^[2][5]

Meanings

Noun

1. A Greek liquid measure of about nine gallons, the metretes.^[2][4]
2. A jar or cask holding that measure.^[2][4]

Word family

• metrētārius

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
6. ^ a b c d e Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
7. ^ Pokorny, Julius (1959), Indogermanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, Bern; Munich: Francke
8. ^ a b Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften