permuto

Forms

permūtō (present infinitive permūtāre, perfect active permūtāvī, supine permūtātum); first conjugation^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin per- (“through, thoroughly”) + mūtō (“to change”).^[2][3][1] De Vaan, who dates it from Plautus, treats mūtō under mūtuus (“borrowed, mutual”): both presuppose a noun Proto-Italic *moito- (“object of change”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₂moi-to- or from the root Proto-Indo-European *mith₂- (“to exchange”) of mittō.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Plautus has it first, in the Captivi: “you have exchanged names between you”.^[2][4][5]

Semantic evolution

Its core is exchange: to give one thing and take another, to sell for a price or buy, and in the passive, of coin, to be received as the equivalent of so many asses.^[2][6] In Cicero's business letters it is to remit money by a bill of exchange, or to raise money on one.^[2] It is also to change something completely, as Cicero speaks of altering the whole state of the commonwealth, and to switch two things round, as he does with the order of words.^[2][6] The TLL finds it from Plautus, Cicero, Lucretius and Varro on, more often in Pliny the Elder, the Digest and above all Boethius.^[3]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus of exchanging names.^[2][5]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero of bills of exchange and of transposing words.^[2][5]
• 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder of the denarius exchanged for sixteen asses.^[2][5]
• late 14th century – English permute is borrowed through Old French and directly.^[7]

Meanings

Verb

1. To exchange, swap; to give up in exchange; to sell; to receive in exchange.^[2][6][1]
2. (finance) To remit money by a bill of exchange; to obtain money on one.^[2]
3. To change completely, transform.^[6][8][1]
4. To transpose, interchange; to reverse an order.^[2]

Word family

• permūtātiō

Related words

• commūtō
• dēmūtō
• ēmūtō
• immūtō
• mūtō
• submūtō
• trānsmūtō

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 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 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 d Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
6. ^ a b c d Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
8. ^ Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson