Etymologically
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suspirium

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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [sʊsˈpiː.ri.ũː][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [susˈpiː.ri.um][1]

Forms

suspīrium n (genitive suspīriī or suspīrī); second declension[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin suspīrō (“to sigh”) + -ium.[2][1] That verb is a compound of sub- and spīrō (“to breathe”), for which de Vaan reconstructs Proto-Italic *spīr/s-, possibly an imitation of the sound of breathing, without direct cognates.[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Plautus uses it in the Cistellaria (to fetch a sigh from deep down) and in the Truculentus.[4]

Semantic evolution

It is a sigh of anguish or longing: Cicero has love without longing, care or sighing in the Tusculans.[2][4] An inscription (CIL 4.4397) calls a man named Celadus the girls' sigh, the man they sigh for.[2] It also means a deep, laboured breath, as Seneca describes the signs of a tired man,[2] and a breath taken in a pause, as in Lucan.[2] Columella has crebrum suspīrium, frequent heavy breathing.[4] Döderlein contrasts a sigh, the direct outcome of distress, with gemitus, a groan, given to vent actual pain.[5] Stelten glosses it “sigh, desire”.[6]

Timeline

  • c. 250–184 BC – Plautus, of a deep sigh.[4][7]
  • 81–43 BC – Cicero, of the sighs of love.[2][4][7]
  • 4 BC–65 AD – Seneca, of laboured breathing.[2][7]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A sigh (of anguish or longing); one who is sighed for.[2][4][1]
  2. A deep or laboured breath; a breath taken in a pause; a gasp.[2][4][1]
  3. (Ecclesiastical Latin) Longing, desire.[6]

Word family

  • suspīriōsus

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ 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 Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  5. ^ Döderlein, Ludwig (1874), Döderlein’s Hand-book of Latin Synonymes, tr. H. H. Arnold, Andover: W. F. Draper
  6. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
  7. ^ a b c Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de