puerperium

Forms

puerperium n (genitive puerperiī or puerperī); second declension^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin puerpera (“woman in childbirth”) + -ium,^[1][2][3] and so goes back to puer (“boy, child”) and pariō (“to give birth”).^[4][5]

Suetonius explains that any birth, whatever the child's sex, was given this name because the ancients also called girls puerae.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Plautus has it first,^[6][3] in the Truculentus, in the phrase puerperiō cubāre “to lie in childbed”.^[2][7]

Semantic evolution

The TLL finds the singular from Plautus, Catullus and Varro on, and the plural from the elder Seneca.^[3] It meant childbirth and the time of lying-in: Tacitus names Antium as a place of birth and speaks of a woman distinguished by her many children.^[2][8] Columella pictures the earth glad in an endless childbearing.^[2]

By metonymy it meant the offspring of one delivery: Pliny the Elder says that when twins are born the mother or one of the children rarely survives, and Gellius reports what Aristotle wrote about the number born at a single birth.^[4][2] In British medieval Latin virgināle puerperium and similar phrases named the Virgin Birth, the birth of Christ, and pictures of the Nativity.^[9]

Italian puerperio continues it.^[7] English used the naturalised puerpery from about 1600 and took puerperium itself as a medical term for the confinement after childbirth in 1863.^[10]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus uses it of lying in childbed.^[2][6]
• 1st century AD – Columella pictures the earth in endless childbearing.^[2][6]
• 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder uses it of the children of one delivery.^[4][6]
• c. 75–c. 150 AD – Suetonius explains why any birth is called by this name.^[3][6]
• c. 165 AD – Gellius uses it of the number of children born together.^[4][2][6]
• 639–709 AD – Aldhelm speaks of the virgin birth.^[9][6]
• 1863 – English borrows it as a medical term.^[10]

Meanings

Noun

1. Childbirth, delivery; childbed, confinement.^[4][2]
2. The offspring born at one delivery; a newborn child.^[4][2][8]
3. (Medieval Latin) The Virgin Birth, the birth of Christ.^[9]

Related words

• pariō
• puer
• puerperus
• English puerperium

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
3. ^ a b c d e Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ a b c d e f Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ Bianchi, Rossella; Lelli, Olga (2014), VOLI: Vocabolario di latino, Florence: Le Monnier
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 Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
8. ^ a b Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
9. ^ 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
10. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com