nemorosus

Forms

nemorōsus (feminine nemorōsa, neuter nemorōsum); first/second-declension adjective^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin nemus (“grove, wood”) + -ōsus.^[2][1][3][4] The noun goes back to Proto-Italic *nem-os- and Proto-Indo-European *nem-o/es- (“what is distributed, sacrifice”).^[5] De Vaan explains the sense “forest, holy clearing”, which Greek, Celtic and Italic share, as a development from “sacrifice” through “place of sacrifice”.^[5]

Cognate with Ancient Greek νέμος (némos, “forest”) and Old Irish nemed (“sanctuary, holy place”).^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is first found in a fragment of Sallust, of a wooded valley,^[6][7][4] and in Virgil's nemorōsa Zacynthos, “wooded Zacynthus”.^[2][8]

Semantic evolution

Lewis and Short call it a poetic word that later also appears in prose.^[8] The TLL finds it in Sallust's prose, then from Columella on, and in verse from Virgil and Ovid on.^[7] It meant covered with woods: Ovid has nemorōsīs montibus, “on wooded mountains”, Pliny the Elder a wooded valley, Juvenal a town set among wooded ridges, and Pliny the Younger a hill wooded with ancient cypress.^[2][8] By extension it meant leafy or bushy, like a grove: Pliny the Elder uses it of a plane tree's crown and Silius of the branches of a yew.^[2][6] The Vulgate has frondibus nemorōsus, “thick with leaves”.^[8]

Medieval British writers used it of wooded land, of leafy or shady places, and of things located in woodland,^[9] and figuratively: Aldhelm speaks of nemorōsīs sillabārum saltibus, “the wooded glades of syllables”, in the dense forest of Latinity.^[9]

Timeline

• 86–34 BC – Sallust uses it of a valley.^[6][4]
• 70–19 BC – Virgil calls Zacynthus wooded.^[2][4]
• 43 BC–18 AD – Ovid uses it of wooded mountains.^[2][4]
• 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder uses it of a bushy tree crown.^[2][4]
• 390–406 AD – The Vulgate uses it of thick foliage.^[8][4]
• 639–709 AD – Aldhelm uses it figuratively of the “glades” of syllables.^[9][4]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Covered with woods or forest, wooded.^[2][8][9]
2. Resembling a grove; leafy, bushy, shady.^[2][8][9]
3. (Medieval Latin) Located in woodland.^[9]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ Bianchi, Rossella; Lelli, Olga (2014), VOLI: Vocabolario di latino, Florence: Le Monnier
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
5. ^ a b c de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
6. ^ a b c Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
7. ^ a b Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
8. ^ a b c d e f g Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ a b c d e f Latham, R. E., D. R. Howlett, R. K. Ashdowne, et al. (1975–2013), Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources, London: British Academy / Oxford University Press