Etymologically
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posteri

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Forms

posterī m pl (genitive posterōrum); second declension[1]

Etymology

It is the masculine plural of the adjective posterus (“coming after, later”) used as a noun, “those who come after”.[2][3] The adjective is formed from post (“after, behind”).[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

An inscribed elogium records that a place for a curule chair was given ipsī posterīsque, “to him and his descendants”.[2] Cicero has it of future generations, whom silence could not bury the courage of the soldiers.[2][4]

Semantic evolution

Its first sense is one's descendants, a family's posterity; from that it is people of later ages in general, future generations, and Cicero also uses it of the followers or successors of a philosopher, as the school that came from Aristippus.[2] Church Latin glosses it “posterity, descendants”.[5]

Timeline

  • 81–43 BC – Cicero of future generations and of a philosopher's successors.[2][4]

Meanings

Noun

  1. Descendants, one's posterity.[2][1][5]
  2. People of later ages, future generations.[2][3]
  3. Successors, followers (of a philosopher).[2]

References

  1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  4. ^ a b Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
  5. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson