siliqua

Forms

siliqua f (genitive siliquae); first declension^[1]

Etymology

The origin is uncertain.^[2][1] De Vaan lists it with silex (“flint”), but rejects the older derivation of both by dissimilation from an older ⟨skelik-⟩, and doubts that the flint word is related at all, since the meanings differ; he thinks silīgō (“soft wheat”) is close enough in meaning to come from the same root as this word.^[3] Wiktionary considers a substrate origin likely,^[1] while Köbler compares Proto-Indo-European *skel- (“to cut”).^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

De Vaan and Köbler date it from Varro,^[3][4] whose farming treatise uses it of bean pods that have not yet grown enough for the beans to be picked.^[2][5]

Semantic evolution

Its basic sense is a pod of beans and other pulses:^[2][6] Virgil has a crop of pulse with rattling pods, and Columella and Pliny the Elder use it in farming.^[2] In the plural it came to mean pulse as a cheap food: Horace has someone who lives on pods and second-grade bread, and Persius and Juvenal use it in the same way.^[2][6]

Siliqua Graeca, or simply siliqua, is the carob tree or its fruit in Columella and Pliny the Elder, and siliqua Syriaca a kind of carob.^[2][6] Columella also reports that country people gave the name to fenugreek.^[2][7] In late writers it was a very small weight, one sixth of a scruple,^[7][5] and in the Code of Justinian a coin worth one twenty-fourth of a solidus.^[6][7] Medieval Latin used it as a weight of gold.^[8]

British medieval writers used it for a husk or pod, often as the food of pigs, with reference to the prodigal son in the Gospel of Luke;^[9] Bede writes of a pod that fills the body but does not nourish it, and it also stood for something worthless.^[9] Italian serqua comes from it.^[5]

Timeline

• 116–27 BC – Varro uses it of bean pods.^[2][4]
• 70–19 BC – Virgil uses it of rattling pods.^[2][4]
• 1st century AD – Columella uses siliqua Graeca of the carob tree.^[2][4]
• c. 400 AD – Vegetius uses it of a small weight.^[7][4]
• 528–534 AD – The Code of Justinian uses it of a coin.^[6][4]

Meanings

Noun

1. A pod or husk of pulses;^[2][6] (plural) pulse.^[2][6]
2. (usually siliqua Graeca, also Syriaca) The carob tree or its fruit.^[2][6]
3. Fenugreek.^[2][7]
4. (Late Latin) A very small weight, one sixth of a scruple; a coin, one twenty-fourth of a solidus.^[7][6]

Word family

• silicula
• siliquor
• siliquastrum

Related words

• silīgō

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ 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
4. ^ a b c d e f g Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
5. ^ a b c Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
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 c d e f Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
8. ^ Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill
9. ^ a b 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