Etymologically
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permano

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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [pɛrˈmaː.noː][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [perˈmaː.no][1]

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

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