prooemium

Pronunciation

• Classical: [proˈoe̯.mi.ũː]^[1]
• Ecclesiastical: [proˈɛː.mi.um]^[1]

Forms

prooemium n (genitive prooemiī or prooemī); second declension^[1] Also spelt prohoemium and prohēmium.^[2] Old manuscripts do not have prooem-: they write prohoem-, prohem- or proem-.^[3]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ancient Greek προοίμιον (prooímion, “prelude, introduction”).^[2][4][5] Beekes explains the Greek word as a noun made from a phrase, properly what comes before the song, οἴμη (oímē, “song, chant, tale”) or οἶμος (oîmos): the opening of the song, an introductory chant, a preamble.^[5] Köbler analyses it as πρό (pró, “before”) and οἶμος “way, course”.^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first dated source is the Rhetorica ad Herennium, which explains that one kind of opening of a speech, principium, is what the Greeks call prooemium.^[2][6]

Semantic evolution

It names a prelude in music, as in Cicero's citharoedi prooemium, a lyre player's prelude,^[2][4] and above all the introductory part of a speech or poem: Cicero has the phrase longo prooemio respondere “to reply with a long preamble”, and Quintilian says that Homer laid down the rule for proems in a few lines at the beginning of each of his poems.^[2][4] Quintilian also explains that the Greek name says more clearly than Latin principium or exordium that this part comes before the matter itself begins.^[4] Figuratively it is the beginning or prelude of something: Cicero speaks of things buried in the prelude of a consulship, Florus of the town that was the prelude of a war, and Juvenal of the prelude to a brawl.^[2]

Medieval writers kept it for the preface of a book or work: Gildas uses it for the opening of a prophet's book, and Alcuin, in a letter of 801, for an apostle's opening words.^[7] Through Old French proheme it passed into English as proem in the late 14th century.^[8]

Timeline

• 86/82 BC – The Rhetorica ad Herennium gives it as the Greek name for the opening of a speech.^[2][6]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it of a speech's preamble, of a musical prelude and of the beginning of a consulship.^[2][4][6]
• c. 35–95/96 AD – Quintilian discusses the proems of speeches and of Homer's poems.^[2][4][6]
• c. 120 AD – Florus uses it of the beginning of a war.^[2][6]
• c. 510–570 AD – Gildas uses it of the opening of a prophet's book.^[7][6]
• late 14th century – English borrows it, through Old French, as proheme, later proem.^[8]

Meanings

Noun

1. (music) A prelude, overture.^[2][4]
2. The introductory part of a speech, poem or book: a preface, preamble, proem.^[2][4][7]
3. (figurative) The beginning or prelude of a period or process.^[2]

Word family

• prooemior

Related words

• exordium
• principium
• English proem

Usage notes

Latin near-synonyms are exordium and principium;^[4] Quintilian preferred the Greek term because it shows that this part precedes the matter of the case.^[4]

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 Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ a b Beekes, Robert S. P. (2010), Etymological Dictionary of Greek, with the assistance of Lucien van Beek, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 10, Leiden; Boston: Brill
6. ^ a b c d e f g Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
7. ^ a b c Latham, R. E., D. R. Howlett, R. K. Ashdowne, et al. (1975–2013), Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources, London: British Academy / Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com