praevaricator

Forms

praevāricātor m (genitive praevāricātōris); third declension^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin praevāricor (“to walk crookedly; to collude”) + -tor.^[2][3][4] That deponent is formed from prae- (“before”) and vāricō (“to straddle”),^[2][1] which de Vaan lists among the derivatives of vārus¹ (“bow-legged”).^[5]

The Romans explained it in several ways: Festus, in Paul's epitome, derived it from going past, Cicero said it was used of one who seemed placed on both sides of a case, and the Digest calls the praevaricator a kind of “straddler” who helps the other side.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is first found in Cicero,^[6][4] of an advocate who colludes with the other side to spoil a case.^[2][3]

Semantic evolution

In Roman law it named an accuser who colluded with the defendant, or a defender who did so with the prosecution, a sham accuser or advocate.^[2][3] Cicero also uses it with a genitive of the cause betrayed, and so does Caelius in a letter to him, of the public cause.^[3] The TLL notes that it occurs in only a few places in Cicero, Caelius and Labeo.^[4]

Christian writers widened it to a transgressor of the law, a sinner, as in the Vulgate,^[3][7] and to an apostate, one who abandons the faith once received, as Hilary defines it.^[3][7] The medieval sense is the same: a betrayer of the faith.^[8]

Timeline

• 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it of an advocate who colludes with his opponent.^[2][6]
• c. 250–317 AD – Lactantius uses it of one who betrays God.^[3][6]
• c. 315–367/368 AD – Hilary of Poitiers calls apostates by this name.^[3][6]
• 390–406 AD – The Vulgate uses it of a transgressor of the law.^[3][6]

Meanings

Noun

1. (law) An advocate who colludes with the opposing side, a sham accuser or defender, a prevaricator.^[2][3]
2. One who betrays (a cause).^[3]
3. (Ecclesiastical Latin) A transgressor, sinner.^[3][7]
4. (Ecclesiastical Latin) An apostate.^[3][7][8]

Related words

• praevāricātiō

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
4. ^ a b c Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
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 Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
7. ^ a b c d Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
8. ^ a b Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill