proprietarius

Forms

proprietārius m (genitive proprietāriī or proprietārī); second declension^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin proprietās (“ownership; property”) + -ārius.^[2][3][1] That noun comes from proprius (“one's own”).^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLL finds it in legal language from the jurist Julian on, often in Ulpian;^[3] it meant an owner, especially one who owns a thing while another has its usufruct.^[2][5]

Semantic evolution

Gaius (140–180 AD)^[6] uses it in the same legal sense,^[3][6] and the Sententiae of Paulus have it as an adjective, proprietaria res, a thing belonging to someone as his property.^[5] The TLL notes that it also passed into Greek.^[3]

Medieval Latin used it as an adjective “of ownership, of a proprietor”, and as a noun for an owner;^[7][8] a monachus proprietarius was a monk who kept private property against his vow of poverty.^[7][8] English proprietary (mid-15th century) first described such clerics, who held more worldly goods than they needed.^[4]

Timeline

• 140–180 AD – Gaius uses it of an owner in the Digest.^[3][6]
• before 223 AD – Ulpian uses it often.^[2][3][6]
• 1234 – A visitation at Bury excommunicates monks who own property.^[8]
• mid-15th century – English borrows it as proprietary.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. (law) An owner, proprietor, especially one without the usufruct.^[2][5][3]
2. (Medieval Latin) A monk who owns private property.^[7][8]

Adjective

1. Of an owner; belonging to someone as his property.^[5][9]
2. (Medieval Latin) Of ownership, proprietary.^[7][8]

Related words

• proprietās
• English proprietary

References

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