ocrea

Forms

ocrea f (genitive ocreae); first declension^[1]

Etymology

The origin is uncertain; the OLD marks it as doubtful.^[2] The TLL thinks the word foreign, perhaps Carian, since Pliny the Elder says that the Carians invented greaves.^[3][4] Lewis & Short and Wiktionary compare Ancient Greek ὄκρις (ókris, “prominence”),^[4][1] and Köbler connects it with Proto-Indo-European *ok̑ri- (“corner, point”).^[5][6] Ancient grammarians derived it from ob crus, “against the shin”, as Varro does, or with Festus from ocris, a rugged mountain, for greaves with uneven bosses.^[3][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Köbler dates it from Varro,^[5] who explains it in the De lingua Latina as the piece set against the shin.^[3][7]

Semantic evolution

It was usually plural, a pair of greaves.^[2] Virgil has greaves of pliant silver, and Livy lists bronze greaves with helmet, shield and breastplate; he also notes that the Samnites wore one on the left leg only.^[3][4] In Petronius per scūtum per ocream, “by shield and by greave”, is a proverb for trying every means.^[2][3] Juvenal uses it of a gladiator's greaves,^[3][4] the poem Moretum of a farmer's leggings,^[2] and Vegetius writes that foot soldiers were made to wear iron greaves on the right leg.^[3][4] In Ecclesiastical Latin it is a metal greave.^[8]

Timeline

• 116–27 BC – Varro explains the word as a guard set against the shin.^[3][5]
• 70–19 BC – Virgil writes of silver greaves.^[3][5]
• 59 BC–17 AD – Livy uses it of bronze greaves and of the Samnites' single greave.^[3][4][5]
• before 66 AD – Petronius uses the proverb per scūtum per ocream.^[3][5]
• c. 400 AD – Vegetius writes of iron greaves worn on the right leg.^[3][5]

Meanings

Noun

1. A greave, a guard for the shin worn by soldiers and gladiators, usually in the plural.^[2][4][8]
2. A protective legging worn by farm workers or hunters.^[2][4]

Word family

• ocreātus

Usage notes

Ocrea was also a Roman cognomen, as of Gaius Luscius Ocrea in Cicero.^[4] The proverb per scūtum per ocream corresponds to “by hook or by crook”.^[2]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l 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 Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ a b c d e f g Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
6. ^ Pokorny, Julius (1959), Indogermanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, Bern; Munich: Francke
7. ^ Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
8. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson