praeputium

Forms

praepūtium n (genitive praepūtiī or praepūtī); second declension^[1]

Etymology

The first part is prae- (“in front”), so that the word names what lies at the front of the penis; the origin of the second part, the TLL says, has not yet been explained.^[2][3] Walde–Hofmann and Pokorny reconstruct an Old Latin *pūtos (“penis”), perhaps from Proto-Indo-European *pew- (“to blow (up)”).^[1][4] De Vaan compares pustula, but finds the analysis as “what is at the front of the *pūt(o)-” uncertain, although naming the penis as “that which swells” is conceivable.^[5]

Lewis and Short took it as a hybrid of ⟨prae-⟩ and Greek πόσθιον (pósthion).^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

Its first known use is in Varro's Menippean satires, in a description of a god “round, … without a head, without a foreskin”;^[2][4] Seneca quotes the line in the Apocolocyntosis to mock the Stoics' idea of god.^[2][4]

Semantic evolution

Juvenal uses it twice, once of the Jews' custom of circumcision.^[2] It became common with the Latin Bible, from the Old Latin versions on,^[2] where it is used of circumcision and, figuratively, in the call to circumcise the foreskin of the heart, that is, to put away impurity, which Lactantius also quotes.^[6][7] In Ecclesiastical Latin it also meant the state of being uncircumcised.^[8][6] The TLL notes that it is not found in the language of the physicians.^[2]

Through Old French prepuce it is the source of English prepuce.^[9]

Timeline

• 116–27 BC – Varro uses it in his Menippean satires.^[2][4]
• 4 BC–65 AD – Seneca quotes Varro's line in the Apocolocyntosis.^[2][7][4]
• c. 67–c. 127 AD – Juvenal uses it, in the plural, of circumcision.^[6][2][4]
• c. 250–317 AD – Lactantius uses it figuratively of the heart.^[6][7][4]
• 390–406 AD – The Vulgate uses it of circumcision in Genesis.^[6][7][4]
• c. 1400 – English borrows it, through Old French, as prepuce.^[9]

Meanings

Noun

1. The foreskin, prepuce.^[3][6]
2. (Ecclesiastical Latin) Uncircumcision, the state of being uncircumcised.^[8][6]
3. (figurative) Impurity: praeputium cordis, “the foreskin of the heart”.^[6][10]

Word family

• praeputio

Related words

• English prepuce

Usage notes

It is sometimes spelled praepudium in manuscripts.^[2]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
3. ^ a b Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
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 d e f g h i Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ a b c d Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
8. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
9. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
10. ^ Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.