subsilio

Forms

subsiliō (present infinitive subsilīre, perfect active subsiluī); fourth conjugation, no passive, no supine stem^[1] It is also spelled ⟨sussiliō⟩.^[2][3][1]

Etymology

It is from Latin sub- + saliō¹ (“to leap, jump”).^[1][4][2][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is found first in Plautus, of a person jumping up: in the Casina a character reports that someone leapt up and struck him in the face.^[6][4]

Semantic evolution

In the literal sense it is used of people and animals springing up,^[6][4] and of things treated as if alive: in Plautus door bolts are begged to leap up, Lucretius has fires that leap up to the roofs of houses, and Propertius uses it of the losing throw of the dice, the “dogs”, that kept turning up.^[6][3] Apuleius says that Pegasus leaps up all the way to the sky.^[4] Lewis and Short call it mostly poetic and absent from Cicero.^[4]

Seneca uses it figuratively of a mind that springs up and stands firmer,^[2][7][3] and in the De clementia, in an uncertain reading, transitively of plunging beneath the earth.^[6][2][3] In Ecclesiastical Latin it means “to leap up, skip”.^[8]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus uses it of a person jumping up.^[6][9]
• 96–55 BC – Lucretius uses it of fires leaping up.^[6][9]
• 57/46–12 BC – Propertius uses it of a throw of the dice.^[6][9]
• 4 BC–65 AD – Seneca uses it figuratively and, transitively, of plunging under the earth.^[6][2][9]
• c. 125–175 AD – Apuleius uses it of Pegasus leaping to the sky.^[6][9]

Meanings

Verb

1. (intransitive) To jump up, spring up, leap upwards.^[6][4]
2. (figurative) To spring up, react.^[2][3]
3. (transitive) To leap into, plunge beneath.^[6][7]

Word family

• subsultim
• subsultō

Related words

• saliō¹

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
3. ^ a b c d e 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 Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ Bianchi, Rossella; Lelli, Olga (2014), VOLI: Vocabolario di latino, Florence: Le Monnier
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ a b Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
8. ^ Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
9. ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de