saeptum

Forms

saeptum n (genitive saeptī); second declension^[1] It is also spelled sēptum, and is usually plural.^[2][3]

Etymology

Used as a noun, it is the neuter participle from Latin saepiō (“to fence in, enclose”).^[2][1] That verb comes from saepēs (“hedge, fence”), which de Vaan traces to Proto-Italic *saip-i-; a link with Proto-Indo-European *seh₂-i- (“to tie”) is tempting, he says, but the suffix it needs is unknown.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Köbler dates it from Cicero.^[5] Lucretius says that smell does not pass through stone walls, saxea saepta.^[2]

Semantic evolution

It is an enclosed space, especially a fold or paddock for animals, as in Varro;^[2] Varro also has a game preserve enclosing about four thousand paces, and Columella a fish enclosure.^[2] The plural saepta named the voting enclosures in the Campus Martius, into which Cicero says a man burst, and Cicero speaks of a tribune attacked with fragments of their wooden fence.^[2] It is also a surrounding wall or fence,^[2][3] a sluice or weir in Ulpian,^[2] and in Celsus a partition in the body, the diaphragm.^[2] Church Latin has it as fence, wall, enclosure, hedge.^[6]

Timeline

• 96–55 BC – Lucretius, of stone walls.^[2][5]
• 116–27 BC – Varro, of folds and a game preserve.^[2][5]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero, of the voting enclosures.^[2][5]
• 14–37 AD – Celsus, of the diaphragm.^[2][5]
• before 223 AD – Ulpian, of a sluice.^[2][5]

Meanings

Noun

1. An enclosure, fold for animals;^[2][1] a game preserve; an enclosure for fish.^[2][1]
2. (plural) The voting enclosures in the Campus Martius.^[2][1]
3. A surrounding wall or fence.^[2][3][1]
4. A barrier: a sluice, weir;^[2][1] (medicine) a partition, the diaphragm.^[2][1]

Word family

• saeptatus
• saeptuōsus

Related words

• saepiō
• saepēs
• praesaepe

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j 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 q r s t Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
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 c d e f Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
6. ^ Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson