posteritas

Forms

posteritās f (genitive posteritātis); third declension^[1] A manuscript of Servius spells it postteritās.^[2]

Etymology

It is formed from posterus (“coming after”) with the suffix -tās.^[3][2][1] De Vaan explains ⟨posterus⟩ as the old comparative of post (“after”), from Proto-Italic *post-ero- (“later”), and ⟨post⟩ from Proto-Indo-European *pos(ti) (“after”).^[4] Cognate with Oscan pústreí (“later”) and Umbrian postra (“later”).^[4] Servius explained it as ⟨postera aetās⟩, “the later age”, and Isidore of Seville also discusses it.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

Köbler gives Cicero as its first author,^[5] who asks Verres whether he should have considered one year and neglected the interest of the state for the future.^[3]

Semantic evolution

It is future time, the time to come, as in the Verrines, and future generations, posterity, as Cicero's “not even the posterity of all ages will forget this” and his hope that the friendship of Scipio and Laelius will be known to posterity.^[3][6] It is also descendants, offspring, as in the declamations ascribed to Quintilian, and posthumous fame, as Cicero's “no one of us faces dangers for the state without the hope of posterity”.^[3][1]

Church Latin glosses it “progeny, future, offspring”,^[7] and in medieval Latin it is descent and offspring.^[8]

Timeline

• 81–43 BC – Cicero of the future, of posterity and of posthumous fame.^[3][5]

Meanings

Noun

1. Future time, the future.^[3][6][1][7]
2. Future generations, posterity; descendants, offspring.^{[3][6][1][7][8]}
3. Posthumous fame.^[3]

Related words

• posterus
• post
• posterior
• prōgeniēs
• English posterity

Usage notes

Döderlein notes that stirps, genus and gēns denote a race in the ascending line, the ancestors, while prōsāpia, prōgeniēs, prōpāgō, prōlēs and subolēs denote it in the descending line.^[9]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
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 Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
6. ^ a b c Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ a b c Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
8. ^ a b Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill
9. ^ Döderlein, Ludwig (1874), Döderlein’s Hand-book of Latin Synonymes, tr. H. H. Arnold, Andover: W. F. Draper