pumex

Forms

pūmex m or f (genitive pūmicis); third declension^[1] Catullus uses it as a feminine.^[2][3] Plautus has the ablative pūmicī.^[2]

Etymology

It is inherited from Proto-Italic *poim-Vk-, from Proto-Indo-European *(s)poHi-m- (“foam”), and so related to spūma, “foam”.^[4][1][2][5] Ernout and Meillet thought the name came from the stone's likeness to a sponge, but de Vaan prefers to explain it from its look of petrified foam.^[4] Wiktionary compares rūmex for the unusual suffix.^[1] According to Etymonline the Late Latin form pōmex, from which English took the word, came from Oscan or another dialect.^[6][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Plautus has it first, in the Persa: to ask water of a pumice stone, that is, money of someone who has none.^[2][3][4]

Semantic evolution

It is pumice or any similar volcanic rock.^[2] Plautus already uses it as an image of dryness: a pumice stone is not as dry as a certain old man.^[3] It was used to polish the ends of book rolls, as with Catullus' new little book smoothed with dry pumice, and Propertius extends this to verse polished fine.^[2][3] It also served to smooth the skin, as in Ovid and Juvenal.^[2] In poetry it is any porous rock, and in Horace rocks set against the sea.^[3]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus of asking water of a pumice stone.^[2][7]
• 81/79–52/50 BC – Catullus of a book polished with pumice.^[2][7]
• c. 1400 – English pumice is borrowed through French.^[6]

Meanings

Noun

1. Pumice, a pumice stone; any similar volcanic rock.^[2][3][1]
2. Pumice used to polish books or smooth the skin.^[2][3]
3. (poetic) Any porous rock; a rock.^[3][1]

Word family

• pūmiceus
• pūmicō
• pūmicōsus

Related words

• spūma
• English pumice

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
4. ^ a b c de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
5. ^ a b Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
6. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ a b Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de