sexageni

Forms

sexāgēnī m pl, sexāgēnae f pl, sexāgēna n pl (genitive plural sexāgēnum); first/second-declension distributive numeral adjective^[1][2]

Etymology

It is from Latin sexāgintā (“sixty”) + -ēnī.^[1][3] De Vaan explains that the distributive ending ⟨-ēnī⟩ spread by analogy from the lower numerals such as septēnī and novēnī, and that the numeral itself owes its ⟨ā⟩ to the analogy of quadrāgintā.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

De Vaan records it from Plautus on.^[4] A fragment of Plautus has ibi scrobēs ecfoditō plūs sexāgēnōs in diēs, “dig more than sixty trenches there each day”.^[1]

Semantic evolution

As a distributive it means sixty each or sixty at a time: Cato tells of wild goats that leap more than sixty feet at a time, Livy of ranks of sixty soldiers each, and Augustus records that he gave sixty denarii to each of 320,000 of the urban plebs.^[1][2] In compound numerals the fistula sexāgēnum quīnum of Frontinus is a pipe with a cross-section of sixty-five square digits.^[1][3]

It is also used with little or no distributive force, simply for sixty: Cicero speaks of sixty thousand modii, Manilius of sixty years, and Martial uses it of an indefinitely large number.^[1][2][3]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus uses it of sixty trenches a day.^[1]
• 234–149 BC – Cato uses it of goats leaping more than sixty feet.^[1][5]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it for sixty thousand, without distributive force.^[1][6]
• 59 BC–17 AD – Livy uses it of ranks of sixty soldiers each.^[2][5]
• 40–102/103 AD – Martial uses it of a large indefinite number.^[3]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Sixty each, sixty apiece.^[1][2]
2. Sixty at a time, sixty in each instance.^[1]
3. (with little or no distributive force) Sixty.^[1][2]

Word family

• sexāgēnārius

Related words

• sexāgintā
• sex

Usage notes

Augustine uses the singular, in sexāgēnus frūctus.^[3]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
2. ^ a b c d e f Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
3. ^ a b c d e Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
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 Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
6. ^ Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de