Etymologically
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perlustro

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Forms

perlūstrō (present infinitive perlūstrāre, perfect active perlūstrāvī, supine perlūstrātum); first conjugation[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin per- (“through, thoroughly”) + lūstrō (“to purify; to go round, survey”).[2][3][1] The TLL explains its senses from the different uses of the simple verb, with the ritual of purification by going round showing through in some of them.[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLL finds it from Cicero on.[3] In the Partitiones oratoriae he speaks of all the parts of a subject that are to be gone over in the mind (perlūstrandae animō).[2][4]

Semantic evolution

Livy has it eight times,[3] of a victorious army ranging over the enemy's fields and of men running about the streets to scan everything with their eyes.[2][4] Velleius writes that all Germany was traversed by Roman arms under Tiberius,[4][3] and in Phaedrus a fly boasts that it visits all the temples.[3] Silius uses it nine times and Cassian twelve, but it is missing in Augustine, and manuscripts confuse it with illūstrō.[3] Columella keeps the ritual sense of purifying thoroughly with sulphur, bitumen and a burning torch.[2][4][5]

In Ecclesiastical Latin it means to traverse or pass over.[6]

Timeline

  • 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it of going over a subject in the mind.[2][7]
  • 59 BC–17 AD – Livy uses it of armies and of scanning with the eyes.[2][7]
  • c. 20 BC–30 AD – Velleius uses it of Germany overrun by Roman arms.[4][7]
  • 1st century AD – Columella uses it of purifying with sulphur.[2][7]
  • c. 360–c. 435 AD – Cassian uses it often.[3][7]

Meanings

Verb

  1. To purify thoroughly (with a cleansing material).[2][4][5]
  2. To travel through, range over, traverse.[2][4][8]
  3. With oculīs: to run one's eyes over, scan, scrutinize.[2][8]
  4. With animō: to go over in the mind, ponder, study.[2][8]

References

  1. ^ a b 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 c d e f g h 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 Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  5. ^ a b Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
  6. ^ Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
  7. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
  8. ^ a b c Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier