recurso

Forms

recursō (present infinitive recursāre); first conjugation, intransitive^[1][2] Only forms of the present stem are found.^[3]

Etymology

It is from Latin recurrō (“to run back”) + -tō, a frequentative.^[1][3][4] That verb is a compound of re- and currō (“to run”),^[1][5] which goes back to Proto-Italic *korse/o- and Proto-Indo-European *krs-e/o- (“to run”).^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

Plautus is the first to use it, in quid ego huc recursem?, “why should I keep running back here?”^[1][2]

Semantic evolution

Lucretius uses it of particles that leap far apart and rebound far (longe longeque recursant).^[1][4] From Virgil on it is used figuratively of what keeps coming back to the mind: sub noctem cura recursat, care returns at nightfall, and multa viri virtus animo ... recursat.^[4][1][2] Later poets follow him: Seneca of Medea rushing to and fro, and Statius and Silius of cares and images that keep returning,^[1] and Tacitus writes recursabant animo vetera omina.^[1][4] Terentianus Maurus applies it to metrical feet.^[1] The glossaries explain it as “runs more often”.^[3]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus uses it of running back again and again.^[1][7]
• 96–55 BC – Lucretius uses it of rebounding particles.^[1][7]
• 70–19 BC – Virgil uses it of cares and memories that keep returning.^[1][7]
• 4 BC–65 AD – Seneca uses it in his Medea.^[1][7]
• 98–115 AD – Tacitus uses it of old omens recurring to the mind.^[1][7]

Meanings

Verb

1. To keep running back, return again and again; to run to and fro.^[1][2]
2. To keep rebounding.^[1]
3. (figurative) To keep recurring to the mind.^[1][4]

Related words

• recurrō
• currō

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
2. ^ a b c d Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
3. ^ a b c Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ a b c d e Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
6. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
7. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de