praenavigo

Forms

praenāvigō (present infinitive praenāvigāre, perfect active praenāvigāvī, supine praenāvigātum); first conjugation^[1][2]

Etymology

It is from Latin prae- + nāvigō (“to sail”).^[1][3][4] De Vaan lists nāvigō among the derivatives of nāvis (“ship”), which he traces to Proto-Indo-European *neh₂-u- (“ship”).^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Lewis & Short call it post-Augustan.^[6] The TLL's first examples are from Valerius Maximus, of Lentulus sailing along a coast (litus praenavigans), and in Seneca and Pomponius Mela.^[3]

Semantic evolution

With an object it means to sail past or along: Seneca writes that a villa, ignored while it stood, became famous once Gaius Caesar pulled it down;^[3][2] Mela lists the places that those sailing towards Sunium pass,^[3][2] and Pliny the Elder reports two towns that are passed on the Tigris.^[3][2] Used absolutely it means to sail by: Seneca imagines a man at Baiae counting the adulteresses sailing past,^[3][6] and Pliny says that Onesicritus and Nearchus sailed for twenty days along the coast of the Fish-eaters.^[3][2] The participle could stand as a noun for those sailing past.^[2][7]

Seneca also used it figuratively of life: praenavigavimus, Lucili, vitam (“we have sailed past life, Lucilius”), comparing the stages of life to coasts that drop out of sight.^[3][8]

Timeline

• 4 BC–65 AD – Seneca uses it of sailing past a villa and, figuratively, of life.^[3][9]
• 43/44 AD – Pomponius Mela uses it of coasting past places on the way to Sunium.^[3][9]
• 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder uses it of sailing along a coast and past towns.^[3][9]

Meanings

Verb

1. (transitive) To sail past or along; to coast along.^[1][3][7]
2. (intransitive) To sail by.^[1][3]
3. (figurative) To pass quickly through (life).^[6][3]

Word family

• praenāvigātiō

Usage notes

A Greek–Latin glossary renders it with Ancient Greek παραπλέω (parapléō, “to sail by”).^[10]

References

1. ^ a b c d Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
2. ^ a b c d e f Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ Bianchi, Rossella; Lelli, Olga (2014), VOLI: Vocabolario di latino, Florence: Le Monnier
5. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
6. ^ a b c Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ a b Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
8. ^ Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
9. ^ a b c Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
10. ^ Goetz, Georg (1888–1923), Corpus glossariorum Latinorum, Leipzig: Teubner; vols. VI–VII Thesaurus glossarum emendatarum, digital ed. CGLO, Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften