Etymologically
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quomodo

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Pronunciation

  • IPA (Classical): [ˈkʷoː.mɔ.doː], [ˈkʷoː.mɔ.dɔ][1]
  • IPA (Ecclesiastical): [ˈkʷɔː.mo.do][1]

Forms

quōmodō̆ (not comparable)[1] The final syllable is long in Catullus and short in Horace and Martial.[2][3]

Etymology

It is the ablative of quī (“who, which”) with modus (“manner, measure”), “in what manner”.[2][1][4] It is often written separately, and Plautus and later poets split it (⟨quō tū mē modō⟩).[2][5][3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Plautus uses it as a question: quōmodo … Menaechmō nōmen est factum tibi?, “how did you come to be called Menaechmus?”.[2][4]

Semantic evolution

Quōmodo asks “how?, in what way?”, also in rhetorical questions “how is it possible that?”, with verbs of saying “with what words?”, and alone, “how do you mean?”.[2][1] It asks about a condition, “how are things?” (Horace: Maecēnās quōmodo tēcum?), and in exclamations means “how!, to what a degree!”.[2][5] As a relative it is “in the way that, as”, often with sīc or ita, “just as”, and with the subjunctive “by which means”.[2][1]

Church Latin uses it for “how” and “just as”;[6] medieval Latin also uses it for “that” after verbs of saying and for “in order that”.[7]

Timeline

  • c. 250–184 BC – Plautus: quōmodo … nōmen est factum tibi?.[2][4]
  • 234–149 BC – Cato uses it as a relative, “as”.[2][4]
  • 65–8 BC – Horace: Maecēnās quōmodo tēcum?.[2][4]

Meanings

Adverb

  1. (interrogative) How?, in what way?[2][5][1][6]
  2. In what condition?[2][1]
  3. (exclamatory) How!, to what a degree![2]
  4. (relative) In the way that, as; just as.[2][1][6]
  5. (with subjunctive) By which means, so that.[2][1]
  6. (Medieval Latin) That; in order that.[7]

References

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