trimus

Forms

trīmus (feminine trīma, neuter trīmum); first/second-declension adjective^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin tri- (“three”) + hiems (“winter”), literally “three winters old”, like bīmus “two years old”.^[2][1] De Vaan explains that these numeral compounds keep the double zero grade of the word for winter, Proto-Italic *-χim-o- (“so many winters old”), from Proto-Indo-European *ǵhim-ós (“winter”).^[3] Cognates of hiems include Old Irish gaim (“winter”), Hittite gimm- (“winter”) and Sanskrit हिमा (hímā-, “winter”).^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Köbler records it first in Plautus,^[4] where in the Rudens a father speaks of a daughter lost to him at three years old (filia, trima quae periit mihi).^[5]

Semantic evolution

It means three years old, of children, as in Horace's trimus, a child of three, and Velleius, and of animals such as cows, foals, mares, goats and pigs in Varro, Horace, Petronius and the Vulgate;^[5][6] Pliny the Elder uses it of a tree.^[5][6] Varro has a trimo and a trima, from the age of three, of breeding livestock.^[2] In the jurists trima die means at the end of three years, a period for payment.^[2][6] Medieval writers in Britain still use it, also as a noun, of a child of three.^[7]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus uses it of a daughter lost at the age of three.^[5][4]
• 116–27 BC – Varro uses it of cattle and foals.^[2][5][4]
• 65–8 BC – Horace uses it of a child of three.^[5][4]
• before 223 AD – Ulpian uses trima die of a payment due at the end of three years.^[2][4]
• Medieval Latin – William of Malmesbury uses it of a girl barely three years old.^[7]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Three years old.^[2][5]
2. a trimo, a trima: from the age of three.^[2]
3. trima die: at the end of three years.^[2][6]

Word family

• trīmātus
• trīmulus

Related words

• bīmus
• quadrīmus

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b 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 Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
5. ^ a b c d e f g Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b c d Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
7. ^ a b Latham, R. E., D. R. Howlett, R. K. Ashdowne, et al. (1975–2013), Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources, London: British Academy / Oxford University Press