Etymologically
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obesitas

This is the current revision of this entry, as edited by bogdan on 24 October 2026 at 18:53. This address is a permanent link to this version.
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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [ɔˈbeː.sɪ.taːs][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [oˈbɛː.s̬i.tas][1]

Forms

obēsitās f (genitive obēsitātis); third declension[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin obēsus (“fat”) + -tās.[2][1] The adjective obēsus was the participle of obedō, from ob- and edō1 (“to eat”).[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLL's first example is Columella, who speaks of the excessive fat of cows' bodies.[3][4]

Semantic evolution

Lewis & Short class it as post-Augustan.[5] It meant the fatness or corpulence of people and animals, as in Suetonius' “fatness of the belly”,[5][2][6] and Pliny the Elder used it of trees that suffer from too much sap.[5][3][7] English took it in the 1610s as obesity, from French and directly from Latin.[8]

Timeline

  • 1st century AD – Columella writes of the excessive fat of cows.[3][4]
  • 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder uses it of trees full of resin.[3][5][4]
  • c. 75–c. 150 AD – Suetonius uses it of a belly.[5][6][4]
  • 1610s – Borrowed into English as obesity.[8]

Meanings

Noun

  1. Fatness, stoutness, obesity.[2][5]
  2. (of trees) Excessive bulk or sappiness.[5][7]

References

  1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c d Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
  4. ^ a b c d Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
  5. ^ a b c d e f g Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  6. ^ a b Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
  7. ^ a b Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
  8. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com