reboo

Forms

reboō (present infinitive reboāre, perfect active reboāvī, supine reboātum); first conjugation^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin re- (“back”) + boō (“to bellow”).^[2][3][1] boō is generally taken from Ancient Greek βοάω (boáō, “to shout”);^[2][1] the TLL says it seems to be drawn from the Greek, and Sacerdos already derived it from the Greek verb.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Lucretius uses it of a region resounding with a harsh booming and, transitively, of panelled and gilded temples that do not ring with lyres.^[4][5]

Semantic evolution

It is a poetic word for to resound or re-echo:^[2][4] Catullus has drums that resound in the rites of Cybele, Virgil woods and Olympus that re-echo, and Silius Italicus the rent heavens.^[4][5] Valerius Flaccus uses it of a bear that roars back at wolves, and Paulinus of Nola has the sense to call or cry in answer.^[2][5] Transitively it meant to make something resound, as in Lucretius and in Nemesianus, where an echo returns a song.^[4][5]

Glossaries explain it as resounding or crying back,^[3] and later manuscripts sometimes spell it with ⟨ro-⟩.^[3]

Timeline

• 96–55 BC – Lucretius uses it of a region resounding.^[4][6]
• 81/79–52/50 BC – Catullus uses it of drums.^[4][6]
• 70–19 BC – Virgil uses it of woods and Olympus re-echoing.^[4][6]
• 2nd half of the 3rd century AD – Nemesianus uses it of an echo.^[4][6]
• c. 353–431 AD – Paulinus of Nola uses it of calling in answer.^[5][6]

Meanings

Verb

1. To re-echo, resound.^[2][4]
2. To call or cry in answer; to bellow back.^[2][5]
3. (transitive) To make (something) resound.^[4][5]

Word family

• reboatus

Related words

• boō
• resonō

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ a b c d e f g Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
6. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de