urina

Forms

ūrīna f (genitive ūrīnae); first declension^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Proto-Italic *ūr-īno- (“watery”),^[2][1] an adjective formed from a noun *ūr(o)- (“water”), from Proto-Indo-European *woh₁-r̥ (“water”),^[1][2] a neuter r-stem that de Vaan reconstructs with either ⟨e⟩ or ⟨o⟩ in the root.^[2] He notes that this stem looks very like the other word for water, *wódr̥, and Wiktionary calls it possibly a doublet of it.^[2][1] Cognate with Old Irish fír (“milk”), Cuneiform Luwian u̯ār (“water”), Sanskrit वार् (vā́r, “water”), Avestan vāra- (“rain”) and Old Norse úr (“drizzle”).^[2][1]

The derived verb ūrīnor means to dive, which de Vaan takes to show that “urine” is a secondary meaning and that the noun first meant water;^[2] Walde and Hofmann thought the sense “urine” may have been influenced by Ancient Greek οὖρον (oûron, “urine”).^[2] Leumann instead regarded the noun as a back-formation from the verb, taken as a Latin form of οὐρέω (ouréō, “to urinate”), but this does not explain the sense “to dive”;^[2] Oleson suggested that divers produce more urine while diving, in which case “urine” would be the oldest meaning.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

De Vaan dates it from Varro and Catullus,^[2] who use it of urine;^[3][4] Varro has it in his work on farming.^[3][4]

Semantic evolution

Its usual sense is urine, in Cicero, Celsus, Pliny the Elder and Juvenal,^[5] with a plural used by Pliny, Suetonius and Gellius;^[5] Pliny has ūrīnam reddere for passing urine.^[3] By extension Pliny the Elder and Juvenal use it of semen.^[5][3]

Through Old French orine, urine and directly from Latin it gave English urine about 1300,^[6] and Italian has both orina and urina.^[3]

Timeline

• 116–27 BC – Varro uses it of urine.^[3][2][4]
• 81/79–52/50 BC – Catullus uses it.^[2][3][4]
• 14–37 AD – Celsus uses it in medicine.^[5][4]
• 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder uses it also of semen.^[5][3][4]
• c. 1300 – English borrows it as urine.^[6]

Meanings

Noun

1. Urine.^[7][5]
2. (by extension) Semen.^[5][3]

Word family

• ūrīnālis
• ūrīnor
• ūrīnātor

Related words

• English urine

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i 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 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 Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press