- Confidence
- Established
- Formation
- Compound
- First attested
- Lucretius
- Ultimate origin
- Proto-Indo-European (*weyd-)
Pronunciation
Forms
pervideō (present infinitive pervidēre, perfect active pervīdī, supine pervīsum); second conjugation[1]
Etymology
It is from Latin per- + videō (“to see”).[2][1] De Vaan traces ⟨videō⟩ to Proto-Italic *wid-ē- (“to see”), from Proto-Indo-European *wid-eh₁- (“to see”).[3]
Earliest recorded meaning
Among the OLD's earliest citations are Lucretius and Varro.[2] Köbler dates Lucretius 96–55 BC and Varro 116–27 BC.[4]
Semantic evolution
It meant to see fully, look over, survey, as in Ovid's sōl quī pervidet omnia “the sun who sees everything”, and figuratively to take in with the mind, discern, perceive fully, as in Varro and Cicero.[2][5][6] It survives in Romanian prevedea.[1]
Timeline
Meanings
Verb
Word family
- pervidēns
Related words
References
- ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
- ^ a b c d e f g Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
- ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
- ^ a b c Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
- ^ a b Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
- ^ Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
Cite this entry
“Pervideo.” Etymologically, 16 Oct. 2026, etymologically.com/la/pervideo. Accessed 17 Oct. 2026.
Last edited on . ·