strophium

Forms

strophium n (genitive strophiī or strophī); second declension^[1] It is also spelled strofium.^[2][3]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ancient Greek στρόφιον (stróphion, “band”),^[2][4][5][1] from στρέφω (stréphō, “to turn, twist”).^[1] Georges explains it as something wound around.^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is first found in Plautus,^[7][2] in a fragment of the Aulularia that lists breast-bands among the costly clothes of wives.^[2][3]

Semantic evolution

In comedy Turpilius has a letter hidden between a little tunic and a breast-band,^[2] and Varro uses the word too.^[2][3] Cicero mocks a man who went from the women's headdress, slippers and breast-band to being suddenly a man of the people,^[2][4] and Catullus describes breasts no longer bound by the smooth band.^[2][4] Nonius defines it as a short band that held in a girl's swelling breasts.^[4]

In the Copa it is a headband or chaplet,^[2][4] and Festus says that priests wore such a band on the head in place of a crown.^[2][4] Apuleius uses it of a ship's anchor cables,^[2][4] and Prudentius speaks figuratively of a dactylic garland, a poem.^[6] In ecclesiastical Latin it was a girdle or a headband,^[8] and medieval writers in Britain used it for a belt or girdle, and glossaries for a baldric.^[9]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus uses it of a breast-band.^[2][7]
• 2nd century BC – Turpilius has a letter hidden in one.^[2][7]
• 81/79–52/50 BC – Catullus describes breasts bound with it.^[2][7]
• c. 125–175 AD – Apuleius uses it of anchor cables.^[2][7]
• 348/49–c. 413 AD – Prudentius uses it figuratively of a poem.^[6][7]

Meanings

Noun

1. A twisted band worn by women to support the breasts.^[2][4][6]
2. A headband, a chaplet.^[2][4]
3. A rope, a cable.^[2][4]
4. (Ecclesiastical Latin) A girdle.^[8]
5. (Medieval Latin) A belt; a baldric.^[9]

Word family

• strophiārius
• strophiolum

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 n o p q r Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c Conte, Gian Biagio; Pianezzola, Emilio; Ranucci, Giuliano (2010), il Latino: Vocabolario della lingua latina, 3rd ed., Florence: Le Monnier
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ Saalfeld, Günther Alexander (1874), Index Graecorum vocabulorum in linguam latinam translatorum, Berlin: Weidmann
6. ^ a b c d Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
7. ^ a b c d e f Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
8. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
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