negotiator

Forms

negōtiātor m (genitive negōtiātōris); third declension^[1] Inscriptions also write negotiat- with -tat-, negoc- and negut-.^[2]

Etymology

It is from Latin negōtior (“to do business”) + -tor.^[3][2] The verb comes from negōtium (“business”), which de Vaan, after Benveniste, takes as a compound ⟨*nec-ōtium⟩ “non-leisure”, perhaps modelled on Ancient Greek ἀσχολία (askholía, “lack of leisure, occupation”); ōtium (“leisure”) itself has no etymology.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Köbler's first source is Cicero,^[5] who speaks of a dishonest dealer and asks whether a man was a merchant or a wholesale trader.^[6]

Semantic evolution

It was the wholesale dealer or businessman;^[6][3][1] Lewis and Short compare the shopkeeper institor and the merchant mercātor, and also give the sense “banker”.^[6][3][1] An inscription uses it as a title of the god Mercury.^[3]

Church Latin glosses it “businessman, merchant”.^[7] English negotiator meant “businessman” in the 1590s and “one who negotiates” from about 1600.^[8]

Timeline

• 81–43 BC – Cicero of wholesale dealers.^[6][5]
• 1590s – English negotiator “businessman”.^[8]
• c. 1600 – English sense “one who negotiates”.^[8]

Meanings

Noun

1. A wholesale trader or dealer, a businessman; a banker.^[3][6][1][7]
2. A cult title of Mercury.^[3]

Word family

• connegotiātor
• negōtiātōrius

Related words

• negōtiālis
• negōtiāns
• negōtiātiō
• negōtiolum
• negōtior
• negōtiōsus
• negōtium
• ōtium
• English negotiator

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
3. ^ a b c d e f Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
5. ^ a b Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
6. ^ a b c d e Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
8. ^ a b c Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com