procudo

Forms

prōcūdō (present infinitive prōcūdere, perfect active prōcūdī, supine prōcūsum); third conjugation^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin prō- + cūdō (“to beat, strike”).^[2][1][3] The simple verb goes back to Proto-Italic *kūd-e/o- and Proto-Indo-European *kuh₂-d-e/o- (“to hit”), with cognates such as Lithuanian káuti (“to hit”) and Old Norse hǫggva (“to hew, beat”).^[4] The epitome of Festus derived the related excūdō and incūs (“anvil”) from caedō (“to cut”).^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is found from Plautus on,^[4][6] first in a figurative sense: haec mihi incus est: procudam ego hodie hinc multos dolos, “this is my anvil: today I shall forge many tricks from it”.^[2]

Semantic evolution

In its literal sense it means to hammer out or forge: Lucretius uses it of beating metal into sharp points, Virgil of a ploughman hammering out the blunted tooth of a ploughshare, and Horace of forging swords.^[2][7] Figuratively it means to produce or bring forth, as Lucretius uses it of fire,^[7] and to shape or sharpen, as Cicero speaks of shaping the tongue.^[8][3] Nonius glossed it as “draw out, prolong”.^[5]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus speaks of forging tricks.^[2][6]
• 96–55 BC – Lucretius uses it of hammering metal into points.^[7][6]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero speaks of shaping the tongue.^[8][6]
• 70–19 BC – Virgil uses it of hammering out a ploughshare.^[2][6]
• 65–8 BC – Horace uses it of forging swords.^[8][6]

Meanings

Verb

1. To beat into shape, hammer out, forge.^[2][7]
2. (figurative) To fashion, produce; to hammer out, prolong.^[2][5]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b Bianchi, Rossella; Lelli, Olga (2014), VOLI: Vocabolario di latino, Florence: Le Monnier
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 c Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
6. ^ a b c d e f Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
7. ^ a b c d Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ a b c Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.