monstrositas

Forms

mōnstrōsitās f (genitive mōnstrōsitātis); third declension^[1][2] The manuscripts also have the spelling monstruositas.^[3]

Etymology

It is formed from Latin mōnstrōsus (“monstrous, unnatural”) + -tās.^[3][1][2]

Earliest recorded meaning

Augustine uses it twice in the City of God,^[3] where nothing, he says, can match the monstrosity of Janus beside the Great Mother (7.26), and where he speaks of the folly or monstrosity of idols (7.27).^[3]

Semantic evolution

The word stayed rare: the TLL records only Augustine's two passages,^[3] which are also all that Lewis & Short, Georges and Gaffiot cite.^[4][1][2] In Neo-Latin Matthias Flacius used it of unnatural, shapeless notions.^[5]

Timeline

• 413–426 AD – Augustine uses it in the City of God.^[3][6]

Meanings

Noun

1. Monstrosity, unnaturalness, a monstrous form.^[4][3][1]

References

1. ^ a b c d Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
2. ^ a b c Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
3. ^ a b c d e f g Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ a b Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ Ramminger, Johann, Neulateinische Wortliste: Ein Wörterbuch des Lateinischen von Petrarca bis 1700, www.neulatein.de
6. ^ Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de