profanitas

Forms

profānitās f (genitive profānitātis); third declension^[1]

Etymology

It is formed from Latin profānus + -itās, from the adjective meaning “unholy, profane”.^[2][3][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLL records it in prose from Tertullian (c. 160–220 AD) on,^[2][4] who uses it by metonymy for the pagan writers of the past.^[2][3]

Semantic evolution

It is a word of Christian writers and the Bible only.^[2] Besides paganism and the pagans themselves, it meant impiety and sacrilege: in the Old Latin Bible, the sacred vessels of the Temple are recovered from profanation.^[2] Julian the Pelagian uses it very often, and it was applied to heresies, as in Leo the Great.^[2] The Leonine Sacramentary spells it with ⟨ph⟩.^[2]

Medieval Latin kept the senses heathenism and unbelief.^[5] English borrowed it about 1600 as profanity.^[6]

Timeline

• c. 160–220 AD – Tertullian uses it of the pagan writers.^[2][4]
• end of the 2nd century AD – The Old Latin Bible uses it of profanation in Judith.^[2][4]
• 440–461 AD – Leo the Great uses it of heresy.^[2][4]
• c. 1600 – English borrows it as profanity.^[6]

Meanings

Noun

1. (Ecclesiastical Latin) Paganism; the pagans.^[2][5]
2. (Ecclesiastical Latin) Impiety, profaneness, profanity.^[3][2][7]
3. (Ecclesiastical Latin) Heresy.^[2]

Related words

• English profanity

References

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