nanus

Forms

nānus m (genitive nānī); second declension^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ancient Greek νᾶνος (nânos, “dwarf”),^[2][1][3] which was often written νάννος (nánnos) in Greek manuscripts.^[4] Beekes calls the Greek word onomatopoeic and of unknown origin,^[4] and Köbler, after Frisk, also gives its origin as unknown.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLL records it from Laberius and Varro on.^[3] Varro mentions nanus as a water vessel that came later and kept its Greek name,^[2][6] and Gellius reports that Laberius used nanus instead of the native pumilio for a dwarf.^[2]

Semantic evolution

Lewis & Short call it a word of the popular language, beside the pure Latin pūmiliō.^[6] It named a dwarf: Juvenal mocks calling someone's dwarf “Atlas”, and Suetonius, in his life of Tiberius, mentions a question put by a dwarf; in Propertius the reading is uncertain.^[2][6][3] The poet Cinna has a carriage drawn by a pair of nani, small horses or ponies.^[2][6] The feminine nana appears in Lampridius' life of Alexander Severus.^[6] Paulus' epitome of Festus describes the vessel as low and hollow.^[2]

The word lived on in the Romance languages: Italian nano, French nain, Catalan nan, Spanish enano and Portuguese anão.^[3]

Timeline

• 116–27 BC – Varro names the nanus as a water vessel with a Greek name.^[2][5]
• 57/46–12 BC – A doubtful reading in Propertius may have it for a dwarf.^[2][3][5]
• c. 67–c. 127 AD – Juvenal uses it of a dwarf ironically named Atlas.^[2][5]
• c. 75–c. 150 AD – Suetonius mentions a question put by a dwarf in his life of Tiberius.^[2][5]
• c. 165 AD – Gellius discusses the word and Laberius' use of it.^[2][6][5]

Meanings

Noun

1. A dwarf.^[2][6]
2. A small horse, pony.^[2][6]
3. A low, shallow water vessel.^[2][6]

Word family

• nāna

Usage notes

The native Latin word for a dwarf was pūmiliō;^[6] nānus was the popular, Greek-derived word.^[6]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ a b Beekes, Robert S. P. (2010), Etymological Dictionary of Greek, with the assistance of Lucien van Beek, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 10, Leiden; Boston: Brill
5. ^ a b c d e f Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press