thalamus

Forms

thalamus m (genitive thalamī); second declension^[1] A Greek form thalamos is also used.^[2]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ancient Greek θάλαμος (thálamos, “inner room, bedroom”), especially in its Homeric use.^[2][1][3] Etymonline relates the Greek word to θαλάμη (thalámē, “den, lair”) and θόλος (thólos, “vaulted building”);^[4][5] Köbler gives a root ⟨*dʰel-⟩ “vault, hollow” (Pokorny 245).^[4][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Catullus, in a wedding song: uxor in thalamō tibi est, “your wife is in the bridal chamber”.^[2] Köbler records it from Virgil on.^[5]

Semantic evolution

A poetic word, thalamus is an inner chamber, especially for sleeping: Virgil's Cyrene hears a cry thalamō sub fluminis altī, in her chamber beneath the deep river.^[2][3] Vitruvius uses it technically for a room of the Greek house.^[2] Above all it is the room and bed of a married couple, and so marriage itself: Dido wishes she had lived thalamī expertem, “without marriage”.^[2][1] Pliny uses it of the twin shrines of Apis.^[2]

Church Latin glosses it “bedroom, bridal chamber, couch, platform”.^[6] Köbler records medieval forms such as talamus and a medieval sense “state treasury”.^[5] English took thalamus from Modern Latin in botany in 1753, for the receptacle of a flower.^[4]

Timeline

• 81/79–52/50 BC – Catullus of the bridal chamber.^[2][5]
• 70–19 BC – Virgil of a nymph's chamber and of marriage.^[2][5]
• 23/24–79 AD – Pliny of the shrines of Apis.^[2][5]
• 1753 – English thalamus in botany.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. An inner room, chamber; a bedroom.^[2][1][6]
2. A bridal chamber, the marriage bed;^[2][1][6] (figurative) marriage.^[2][1][6]
3. An inner shrine.^[2]

Related words

• English thalamus

References

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