Etymologically
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subdolus

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Forms

subdolus (feminine subdola, neuter subdolum, adverb subdolē); first/second-declension adjective[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin sub (“under”) + dolus (“deceit”).[1][2][3] De Vaan traces dolus to Proto-Italic *dolo- (“trick”) and compares Ancient Greek δόλος (dólos, “bait, trick”); against the view that Latin borrowed it from Greek, he notes that an inherited *dolh₁-o- "pain, what pains", beside doleō (“to feel pain”), cannot be dismissed.[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Plautus has it first: in the Casina a bride is told to remember to be sly with her husband night and day.[4][3]

Semantic evolution

It describes people who are sly or deceitful, and their words and manner, as Plautus' sly treachery, Caesar's crafty speech and Ovid's deceitful tongue.[4] Propertius uses it of the treacherous bow of the Parthian who shoots from a turned horse.[4] Lewis & Short render it "somewhat crafty", and find it mostly ante-classical and post-Augustan.[5] Church Latin glosses it sly, cunning, crafty, deceitful.[6]

Timeline

  • c. 250–184 BC – Plautus of a sly bride and of treachery.[4][2]
  • c. 50 BC – Caesar of a crafty speech.[4][2]
  • 57/46–12 BC – Propertius of the Parthian bow.[4][2]

Meanings

Adjective

  1. Sly, crafty, deceitful, treacherous; of words and manner, deceptive.[4][5][6][1]
  2. Of weapons or natural things, treacherous.[4]

References

  1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
  3. ^ a b c 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 h Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  5. ^ a b Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  6. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson