Etymologically
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plerus

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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [ˈpɫeː.rʊs][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [ˈplɛː.rus][1]

Forms

plērus (feminine plēra, neuter plērum); first/second-declension adjective[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Proto-Italic *plēro- (“most of”), inherited from Proto-Indo-European *pl(e)h₁-ro- (“full”), an adjective built on the root *pleh₁- (“to fill”).[2][1] The same root gives plēnus “full” and the compounds of -pleō such as compleō and impleō.[2] The OLD and Wiktionary compare Ancient Greek πλήρης (plḗrēs, “full”).[3][1]

The TLL suggests that the word first meant “full” and that the sense “most” was carried over to it from plērusque when the simple form was going out of use.[4] Ancient grammarians already noted it: Festus records that Pacuvius used it, and Priscian says that the oldest writers used it without the particle -que, with the same meaning.[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is found first in Cato's Origines, where a stretch of land is described as for the most part level (ager campestris plerus).[5][6][7]

Semantic evolution

It is an archaic word, the older simple form of the Classical plērusque, plural plērīque “most”.[6][2] Pacuvius used it in his tragedies of the Greeks lost on the rocks of Caphareus and in the phrase plera pars “the greater part”.[6][5] The neuter plērum served as an adverb, “mostly, commonly”, in the historian Sempronius Asellio, as plērumque did later.[6][5]

Timeline

  • 234–149 BC – Cato uses it in the Origines of land that is mostly level.[5][7]
  • 220–130 BC – Pacuvius uses it in his tragedies, including the phrase plera pars.[6][5][7]
  • c. 100 BC – Sempronius Asellio uses the neuter plerum as an adverb.[6][5][7]

Meanings

Adjective

  1. Making up the greater part; in the plural, most of, very many.[3][6]

Adverb

  1. (neuter plērum) For the most part, mostly, commonly.[6][5]

Usage notes

Georges lists the spelling ploerus and cites ploera from Cicero's De legibus,[5] but the TLL holds that the word was wrongly cited there, the text meaning plūra “more”.[4]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
  3. ^ a b Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  4. ^ a b c Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ a b c d Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de