pullamen

Forms

pullāmen n (genitive pullāminis); third declension^[1][2]

Etymology

It is from Latin pullō + -men, according to Georges and Gaffiot.^[1][2] The TLL derives it directly from pullus¹ (“young animal”).^[3]

It lives on in French poulain (“foal”) and Old Occitan polhina (“young mare”).^[3] Conte traces Italian pollame to the Late Latin word.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

It first appears in the veterinary treatise of Chiron (4th century AD),^[5] which uses it, like pullus, for the young of an animal, in a passage on a disease that mostly strikes the young.^[3] Conte reads it there as “embryo”, with a question mark.^[4]

Semantic evolution

The scholia of Bern on Virgil's Georgics have the plural: tertio die pullamina excluduntur, “on the third day the young are hatched”.^[1][3]

In French the word came to mean a foal, and also a device for moving casks.^[3]

Timeline

• 4th century AD – The veterinary treatise of Chiron uses it of the young of an animal.^[3][5]

Meanings

Noun

1. The young of an animal; in the plural, a brood of young.^[1][2][3]
2. Perhaps an embryo.^[4]

References

1. ^ a b c d Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
2. ^ a b c Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
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 Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
5. ^ a b Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de