tabula
Pronunciation
Forms
tabula f (genitive tabulae); first declension[1] The decree on the Bacchanalia spells it tabola.[2][3]
Etymology
The origin is uncertain.[2][1][3] De Vaan reconstructs Proto-Italic *taþlā- (“board”), perhaps a root *ta- with the instrument suffix *-dʰlo-.[2] Southern took the root to be that of “to stand”, so that a board is “what stands”.[2] Others connect it with taberna, or derive it from a root meaning “flat”.[1]
Compare Umbrian tafle (“on the board”), the board used to carry the sacrificial fire.[2]
Earliest recorded meaning
It is found from Plautus onwards,[2][4] and Cato prescribes laying something out “on a clean board”.[3]
Semantic evolution
It meant a board or plank, as Cicero's fool snatching a plank from a shipwreck.[5][6] A painted panel was a tabula picta or simply tabula, a painting, and it was also a gaming board, as in Varro and Ovid.[3] It was a notice board and so a list, as of the proscribed, and a tablet of stone or bronze set up as a record, as the tablet on which the chief pontiff posted the year's events.[3]
It was the wax-covered writing tablet, as when Plautus' schoolboy breaks his tablet over his tutor's head.[3] In the plural it meant account books, legal deeds and public records.[3] Medieval Latin used it for the common revenue of a chapter of canons, a portable altar and an altar front,[7] and music theory for the bridge of an instrument.[8] It survives as Italian tavola, Spanish tabla and Portuguese tábua.[1] English table comes from it through Old French and late Old English, and tablet through Old French about 1300.[9]
Timeline
- c. 250–184 BC – Plautus uses it for writing tablets and account books.[3][4]
- 186 BC – The decree on the Bacchanalia spells it tabola.[2][3]
- 234–149 BC – Cato uses it for a board.[3][4]
- 116–27 BC – Varro uses it for a gaming board.[3][4]
- 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it for paintings, notice boards and deeds.[3][4]
- c. 1300 – English tablet is first recorded.[9]
Meanings
Noun
- A board, plank.[3][5]
- A painted panel, painting.[3][1]
- A gaming board.[3]
- A notice board; a list.[3]
- A tablet (of stone, bronze) with an inscription.[3]
- A writing tablet.[3][1]
- (plural) Account books; deeds; records.[3]
- A map.[1]
- (Medieval Latin) A portable altar; an altar front.[7]
Word family
- tabella
- tablifer
- tabulāris
- tabulārius
- tabulātus
- tabulīnum
- tablīnum
- tabulāmentum
- tabulātim
- tabulātiō
Related words
Usage notes
Döderlein distinguishes axes (asses) and plancae, rough boards as they come from the saw, from tabulae, boards planed smooth.[10]
References
- ^ a b c d e f g h i Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
- ^ a b c d e f g de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
- ^ a b c d e Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
- ^ a b Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
- ^ Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
- ^ a b Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill
- ^ Lexicon musicum Latinum medii aevi (1992–), Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften; online ed. Wörterbuchnetz
- ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
- ^ Döderlein, Ludwig (1874), Döderlein’s Hand-book of Latin Synonymes, tr. H. H. Arnold, Andover: W. F. Draper