Etymologically
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resigno

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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [rɛˈsɪŋ.noː][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [reˈs̬iɲ.ɲo][1]

Forms

resignō (present infinitive resignāre, perfect active resignāvī, supine resignātum); first conjugation[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin re- + sīgnō (“to mark, seal”).[2][3][1] De Vaan derives that verb from sīgnum (“mark, sign”), which he traces to Proto-Italic *sekno- (“statue, sign”) and Proto-Indo-European *sek(h₂)-no- (“cut”), a word for “something cut out, carved” from the root of secō (“to cut”).[4] Cognate with Oscan segúnú (“statues”).[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is found first in Plautus, of letters that were sealed and then opened at the customs house: opsignatas … apud portitorem eas resignatas sibi inspectasque esse, “that the sealed letters had been unsealed and inspected at the customs officer's”.[2][5]

Semantic evolution

The basic sense was to break a seal: of letters (Cicero), wills (Horace) or a box holding the keys of a wine cellar (Pliny the Elder).[2][6] From this it came to mean undoing the binding force of a document or agreement: Cicero speaks of the carelessness of Gabinius destroying all trust in the records, and Silius Italicus has pacta resigna, “break the compact”.[2][6] Poets used it for opening the eyes or lips (Virgil's Mercury opens the eyes of the dead) and for disclosing what is hidden, as Ovid's venientia fata resigna, “reveal the coming fates”.[2][6] A second, older use belonged to bookkeeping: in Cato it seems to mean entering a sum as a debt, and Festus explains that the ancients said resignare for rescribere, and that a soldier's pay was “resigned” when it was recorded as forfeit for an offence.[2][6] Hence Horace's resigno quae dedit, “I give back what Fortune gave”.[2][6] In Ecclesiastical and later Latin it also means to resign or give up,[7][1] and Etymonline traces English resign to it through Old French resigner.[8]

Timeline

  • c. 250–184 BC – Plautus, of unsealing letters.[2][5]
  • 234–149 BC – Cato uses it in an accounting sense.[2][5]
  • 70–19 BC – Virgil, of opening the eyes.[2][5]
  • 65–8 BC – Horace, “give back, resign” what Fortune gave.[2][5]
  • late 14th century – English borrows it, through Old French, as resign.[8]

Meanings

Verb

  1. To unseal, break the seal of; to remove the binding force of, annul (an agreement, a record).[2][6]
  2. To open (the eyes, the lips).[2]
  3. To disclose, reveal.[2][6]
  4. To enter (a sum) as a debt; to record (a soldier's pay) as forfeit.[2][6]
  5. To give back, hand over, resign.[2][6]
  6. (Ecclesiastical Latin) To give up, resign.[7][1]

Word family

  • resignaculum
  • resignatrix

References

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