obloquor

Forms

obloquor (present infinitive obloquī, perfect active oblocūtus sum); third conjugation, deponent^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin ob- + loquor (“to speak”),^[2][3][1] literally “to speak against”.^[4] loquor goes back to Proto-Italic *(t)lokʷ-e/o- and Proto-Indo-European *tlokʷ- (“to talk”).^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is first found in Plautus' Menaechmi, with the dative, of breaking in on a speaker: te morare mihi quom obloquere, “you hold me up when you interrupt me”.^[2][6]

Semantic evolution

Plautus, Afranius and Cicero use it of interrupting and contradicting;^[4][2] Cicero writes to his brother that he would like him to address him, interrupt him and talk with him.^[4] Catullus uses it of railing at someone,^[4] and in the Aeneid the singer obloquitur numeris septem discrimina vocum, accompanying the rhythm with the seven notes of the lyre;^[2][4] Ovid uses it of birdsong.^[4]

From Seneca on it means “to blame, find fault with”,^[4] and the Vulgate has it in the Psalms.^[4] In Ecclesiastical Latin it means to revile, slander or speak against.^[7]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus uses it of interrupting.^[2][4][6]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it of contradicting.^[2][4][6]
• 81/79–52/50 BC – Catullus uses it of railing at someone.^[4][6]
• 70–19 BC – Virgil uses it of a musical accompaniment.^[2][4][6]
• 390–406 AD – The Vulgate uses it of reviling.^[4][6]

Meanings

Verb

1. To interrupt (a speaker), break in; to contradict.^[2][4]
2. To rail at, abuse.^[4]
3. To sing or play as an accompaniment (to).^[2][4]
4. To blame, find fault with.^[4]
5. (Ecclesiastical Latin) To revile, slander.^[7]

Word family

• oblocūtiō
• oblocūtor
• obloquium

Related words

• alloquor
• circumloquor
• colloquor
• ēloquor
• interloquor
• loquor
• praeloquor
• prōloquor
• trāloquor

Usage notes

Lewis and Short give interpellō as a synonym of the first sense.^[4]

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. ^ Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ 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 d e f Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
7. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson