septies

Forms

septiēs (not comparable)^[1] Also septiēns; the OLD files the word under that form.^[2][3][4]

Etymology

It is from Latin septem (“seven”) + -iēs.^[1][2][3] De Vaan traces septem to Proto-Italic *septm̥ and Proto-Indo-European *septḿ̥ (“seven”).^[5][1] Cognate with Sanskrit सप्त (saptá), Ancient Greek ἑπτά (heptá) and Lithuanian septynì, all meaning “seven”.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Köbler records it first in Cicero,^[6] who in the speech for Plancius speaks of a man who, after twice being defeated for the aedileship, was made consul seven times.^[2]

Semantic evolution

It means “seven times, on seven occasions”: Livy says that the strait of Euripus does not ebb and flow seven times a day at fixed hours,^[2] and Pliny the Elder writes of an echo that repeats the same sound seven times.^[2] As a multiplier it forms large numbers, especially in sums of money: septiēns miliēns (with sestertium understood) is seven hundred million sesterces, a sum Cicero asks about in the Philippics.^[2][4][7] Terentianus Maurus uses it for “in seven different ways”.^[2][7]

In Late Latin it also means “for the seventh time”, as in septiēs cōnsul in the Historia Augusta, in Ammianus and in the Theodosian Code.^[4][8][7] In Ecclesiastical Latin it is “sevenfold, seven times”.^[9] Medieval British writers used it in both ways, in reckonings such as Bede's “seven times twelve make eighty-four” and in Alcuin's septies inque die dominum laudare memento, “remember to praise the Lord seven times a day”.^[10]

Timeline

• 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it for “seven times” and in sums of money.^[2][6]
• 59 BC–17 AD – Livy uses it of the tides of the Euripus.^[2][6]
• 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder uses it of an echo.^[2][6]
• c. 390 AD – Ammianus Marcellinus uses it for “for the seventh time”.^[4][6]

Meanings

Adverb

1. Seven times, on seven occasions.^[2][3]
2. Seven times (as a multiplier); septiēns miliēns, seven hundred million (sesterces).^[2][3][4]
3. In seven different ways.^[2][7]
4. (Late Latin) For the seventh time.^[4][8]

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
4. ^ a b c d e f Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
5. ^ 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
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 d Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
8. ^ a b Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
9. ^ Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
10. ^ 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