reparabilis

Forms

reparābilis (neuter reparābile); third-declension two-termination adjective^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin reparō (“to restore, recover”) + -bilis,^[2][3][4] though the TLL allows that it may instead have been formed back from irreparābilis.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Köbler dates it from Ovid,^[6] who writes that the loss of hair can be made good, reparabile damnum est, and that modesty once harmed can be restored by no art.^[5][7]

Semantic evolution

The TLL finds it in verse from Ovid on, in Lucan and Persius, and in the prose of Seneca, the Panegyrici and later writers; it has no comparative or superlative.^[5] Seneca says that people let themselves be charged with the cheapest things, which can certainly be got back, while no one can return lost time,^[5][8] and Valerius Flaccus has a dying man looking back at the sky, which no treasure can regain.^[5][8]

Poets also gave it an active sense, “renewing, restoring”: Calpurnius has a wood that, renewing itself, begins its summer shade, and Persius an echo that repeats a cry.^[2][7] Ausonius uses it of the phoenix coming back to life.^[3][8] Christian writers applied it to bodies restored in the resurrection, as Ambrose does.^[5]

In British medieval Latin it meant “recoverable”, “that can be replaced” (Orderic Vitalis calls a man non reparabilis, irreplaceable) and, in theological disputes, “that can be restored to grace”.^[9] English took reparable from French in the 1560s.^[10]

Timeline

• 43 BC–18 AD – Ovid uses it of a loss that can be made good.^[5][6]
• 4 BC–65 AD – Seneca uses it of things that can be got back.^[5][6]
• 34–62 AD – Persius uses it of a repeating echo.^[2][6]
• c. 310–394 AD – Ausonius uses it of the phoenix.^[3][6]
• 1348 – A council's list of errors uses it of the damned as able to be restored to bliss.^[9]
• 1560s – English borrows reparable from French.^[10]

Meanings

Adjective

1. That can be recovered or restored, retrievable, reparable.^[2][8][7]
2. (poetic) Renewing or restoring itself; of an echo, repeating.^[2][3]
3. (Medieval Latin) That can be restored to a state of grace.^[9]

Word family

• irreparābilis

Related words

• reparō
• English reparable

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
4. ^ Bianchi, Rossella; Lelli, Olga (2014), VOLI: Vocabolario di latino, Florence: Le Monnier
5. ^ a b c d e f g h Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
6. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
7. ^ a b c Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
8. ^ a b c d Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
9. ^ a b c Latham, R. E., D. R. Howlett, R. K. Ashdowne, et al. (1975–2013), Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources, London: British Academy / Oxford University Press
10. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com