Etymologically
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palmes

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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [ˈpaɫ.mɛs][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [ˈpal.mes][1]

Forms

palmes m (genitive palmitis); third declension[1]

Etymology

The OLD and the TLL connect it with palma (“palm of the hand”), though the TLL finds the formation unclear.[2][3] Festus explains that vine shoots were given this name because they put out twigs like the fingers of a human hand.[4][3] De Vaan traces palma to Proto-Italic *palamā- and Proto-Indo-European *plh₂-em-h₂- (“flat, wide”), cognate with Ancient Greek παλάμη (palámē, “palm of the hand”).[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Köbler dates it from Virgil,[6] who has buds swelling on the pliant shoot in the Eclogues.[2]

Semantic evolution

It is a young branch or shoot of a vine, and Lewis & Short note two kinds, one bearing leaves and one bearing fruit.[2][4] It can stand for the whole vine, as Ovid's unwed tree-trunk without a vine.[2] It is also a twig or branch of any tree: Curtius has men pulling down the branches of tall trees with sickles.[2] Church Latin has “branch, shoot of a vine, vine”.[7]

Timeline

  • 70–19 BC – Virgil, of a vine shoot.[2][6]
  • 43 BC–18 AD – Ovid, for the vine.[2][6]
  • 1st century AD – Curtius, of the branches of trees.[2][6]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A young branch or shoot of a vine.[2][4][1][7]
  2. (by extension) The vine.[2][7]
  3. A twig, branch, bough of any tree.[2][1]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
  4. ^ a b c 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 Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
  7. ^ a b c Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson