Etymologically
Log in

sexageni

This is the current revision of this entry, as edited by bogdan on 20 October 2026 at 15:44. This address is a permanent link to this version.
Changes in this edit History

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

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