Etymologically
Log in

panus

This is the current revision of this entry, as edited by bogdan on 16 October 2026 at 04:50. This address is a permanent link to this version.
Changes in this edit History

Pronunciation

  • IPA (Classical): [ˈpaː.nʊs][1]
  • IPA (Ecclesiastical): [ˈpaː.nus][1]

Forms

pānus m (genitive pānī); second declension[1]

Etymology

In the sense “spool” it is probably borrowed from Doric Greek πᾶνος (pânos, “thread on a bobbin”), the Doric form of Attic πῆνος (pênos, “yarn”).[2][1][3] In the sense “abscess” it has been compared with Russian пук (puk, “bunch”) and Russian пучить (púčitʹ, “to swell”), from a root *pnHk-, which Schrijver thinks gives the Latin word regularly, but de Vaan finds it just as likely that the word for a spool was used by metaphor for a swelling and a tuft.[2][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

De Vaan dates it from Lucilius, who mentions the spool of weft beside the upright spindle.[2][3] Köbler dates Lucilius c. 180–102 BC.[4]

Semantic evolution

It meant a spool wound with thread, the bobbin in a shuttle.[3][5] Afranius used it of a kind of superficial abscess, named for its shape, and Pliny the Elder of the main stalk of a panicle in millet.[3][6] Its diminutive pānicula meant a tuft, the feathery head of reeds and grasses, and a kind of wart.[2]

English panicle comes from that diminutive, and English panus was borrowed as a medical term.[1]

Timeline

  • c. 180–102 BC – Lucilius uses it of a spool.[3][4]
  • 2nd century BC – Afranius uses it of an abscess.[3][4]
  • 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder uses it of a stalk of millet.[3][4]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A spool wound with thread, bobbin.[3]
  2. A kind of superficial abscess.[3]
  3. The main stalk of a panicle.[3]

Word family

  • English panicle

References

  1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  4. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
  5. ^ Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  6. ^ Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.