perversio

Forms

perversiō f (genitive perversiōnis); third declension^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin pervertō (“to overturn, distort”) + -tiō, a noun of action.^[2][3] pervertō is formed from per- and vertō (“to turn”).^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Its first record is in the Rhetorica ad Herennium, where a transposition of words is said to disturb their order “by inversion or transposition” (perversione aut transiectione): the sense is a reversal of the normal order of words in a sentence.^[2][4]

Semantic evolution

The TLL notes that it occurs once in the Rhetorica ad Herennium and then only from Tertullian on, far more rarely than perversitas; it means either the act of perverting or a perverted state, and has a technical sense in rhetoric.^[3] In Tertullian it is a distortion or wresting of meaning.^[4]

In Church Latin it came to mean perversion,^[5] and in medieval Latin moral depravity.^[6] English took it over in the late 14th century, first for a turning aside from the truth in religious belief.^[7]

Timeline

• c. 160–220 AD – Tertullian uses it, in his work against Marcion, for a distortion.^[4][3][8]
• Middle Ages – It is used for depravity.^[6]
• late 14th century – Borrowed into English as perversion, of a corruption of religious belief.^[7]

Meanings

Noun

1. (rhetoric) Reversal of the normal order of words, inversion.^[2][4]
2. A turning about; a wresting or distortion.^[4][3]
3. (Ecclesiastical Latin) perversion.^[5]
4. (Medieval Latin) Depravity.^[6]

Related words

• perversitas
• perversus
• English perversion

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c 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. ^ a b c d e Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
6. ^ a b c Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill
7. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
8. ^ Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de