Etymologically
Log in

repto

This is the current revision of this entry, as edited by bogdan on 20 October 2026 at 13:29. This address is a permanent link to this version.
Changes in this edit History

Pronunciation

  • Classical: [ˈreːp.toː][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [ˈrɛp.to][1]

Forms

rēptō (present infinitive rēptāre, perfect active rēptāvī, supine rēptātum); first conjugation, no passive[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin rēpō (“to creep”) + -tō, a frequentative verb.[2][1][3] De Vaan traces the simple verb to Proto-Italic *rēp-e/o- and Proto-Indo-European *h₁reh₁p- or Proto-Indo-European *h₁rēp-, “to creep”, and compares Lithuanian rėplióti (“to creep”).[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The TLL finds it in verse from Plautus on.[5] Plautus has quid in urbe reptās, vīlice haud magnī pretī?, “why are you slinking about in town, overseer of little worth?”, and, in a fragment, maior pars populī āridī reptant fame, of people dragging themselves along, dried up with hunger.[2][6] Köbler dates Plautus c. 250–184 BC.[7]

Semantic evolution

Lewis & Short call it mostly poetic and post-Augustan, and a favourite word of Claudian.[6] Lucretius uses it of woolly sheep creeping over a hill to the grass, and Horace of strolling silently through the woods.[2][6] Pliny the Elder uses it of young locusts without legs or wings and of the creeping shoots of the gourd, Statius and Martial of infants crawling, and Gellius of a chameleon.[2][6] Statius has the passive participle, “crawled over”, of a field.[2][6]

Timeline

  • c. 250–184 BC – Plautus uses it of slinking about.[2][5][7]
  • 96–55 BC – Lucretius uses it of sheep.[2][6][7]
  • 65–8 BC – Horace uses it of strolling in the woods.[2][6][7]
  • 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder uses it of insects and plants.[2][7]
  • c. 165 AD – Gellius uses it of a chameleon.[2][6][7]

Meanings

Verb

  1. To crawl, creep (of people, animals, plants).[2][6][8]
  2. (transitive) To crawl over.[2][6]
  3. To move slowly, stroll about, saunter.[2][3]
  4. To slink about;[2] (of the feeble or blind) to grope one's way.[2]

Word family

  • correpto
  • irreptō
  • obreptō
  • perrēptō
  • rēptābundus
  • rēptātiō
  • reptātus

References

  1. ^ a b c d 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 Bianchi, Rossella; Lelli, Olga (2014), VOLI: Vocabolario di latino, Florence: Le Monnier
  4. ^ 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 c d e f g h i j Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ a b c d e f Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
  8. ^ Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson