permano

Forms

permānō (present infinitive permānāre, perfect active permānāvī, supine permānātum); first conjugation^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin per- + mānō (“to flow, trickle”).^[2][1][3] De Vaan takes mānō as perhaps a verb made from a noun ⟨*māno-⟩, which he tentatively compares with Old Irish móin and Welsh mawn (“peat-bog, moss”); no good root is available, so the connection remains isolated.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

In verse the TLL counts it twice in Plautus, once in Terence and nine times in Lucretius, and in prose from Cato on.^[3] A fragment of Plautus has a shower of love that soaked not only the clothing but flowed into the marrow.^[2]

Semantic evolution

Of liquids it is to flow through, seep or percolate: Lucretius has moisture seeping through rocks and caves and heat passing through silver.^[5][2] It is used too of physical forces and of feelings.^[2] Of abstract things it is to spread or extend to: Cicero writes of nothing that could reach human life from the gods, and of the teaching of Pythagoras that seems to have flowed into the city.^[2] Of a rumour or secret it is to leak out: in Plautus a trick must not become public, in Terence a matter must not reach a father, and in Caesar a report spreads from one source to many.^[2] Apuleius uses it with an object, of hair flowing down over the back.^[2]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus of a trick leaking out and of love soaking through.^[2][3][6]
• 190–159 BC – Terence of news reaching a father.^[2][6]
• 96–55 BC – Lucretius of moisture seeping through rock.^[5][3][6]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero of a teaching spreading.^[2][6]

Meanings

Verb

1. Of liquids, to flow through, seep, percolate; of forces or feelings, to pass through.^[2][5][1]
2. Of abstract things, to spread, extend; of a rumour or secret, to leak out.^[2]
3. (transitive) To flow through, permeate; to flow over.^[2][1]

Word family

• permānascō

Related words

• mānō
• English permeate

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
5. ^ a b c Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b c d Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de