negotiatio

Forms

negōtiātiō f (genitive negōtiātiōnis); third declension^[1] Also spelled negōciātiō.^[2]

Etymology

It is from Latin negōtior (“to do business”) + -tiō,^[3][1] from negōtium (“business”), made of nec (“not”) and ōtium (“leisure”).^[1] Augustine explains it as leisure denied.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Cicero has it first,^[5] in a letter about going to the remains of a business in Asia,^[3] that is, debts still to be collected.^[6]

Semantic evolution

It is wholesale or banking business,^[2][6] and under the Empire any trade:^[6] Livy has a king diverting all the sea trade, Petronius a speaker who gives up trade to lend money to freedmen, and Quintilian calls charging fees for defending clients a trade to be abhorred.^[3] Suetonius says Vespasian carried on dealings shameful even for a private man.^[3][2] Columella has cattle trading, and the jurists the cloth trade.^[2][6] The jurist Gaius uses it for a business, a shop or concern.^[3] The Vulgate has “do not make my Father's house a house of trade”.^[2] Church Latin has business, traffic and merchandise.^[7] English negotiation came from it in the early 15th century, partly through Old French, first in the sense of trading.^[8]

Timeline

• 81–43 BC – Cicero, of business in Asia.^[3][5]
• 59 BC–17 AD – Livy, of maritime trade.^[3][5]
• 140–180 AD – Gaius, of a business establishment.^[3][5]
• 390–406 AD – The Vulgate, “a house of trade”.^[2][5]
• early 15th century – English negotiation.^[8]

Meanings

Noun

1. Business, trade, especially wholesale trade or banking; a commercial transaction.^[3][2][1]
2. A commercial establishment, a business.^[3]
3. (Ecclesiastical Latin) merchandise, traffic.^[7]

Related words

• negōtiālis
• negōtiāns
• negōtiātor
• negōtiolum
• negōtior
• negōtiōsus
• negōtium
• English negotiation

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
5. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
6. ^ a b c d Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
7. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
8. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com