vaccinium

Forms

vaccīnium n (genitive vaccīniī or vaccīnī); second declension^[1]

Etymology

It is perhaps borrowed from Ancient Greek ὑάκινθος (huákinthos, “hyacinth”) in a corrupted form,^[2][3][4] reshaped after the adjective vaccīnus (“of cows”).^[1] The Greek word is a loanword of unknown source.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Virgil is the first to use it, in the Eclogues: alba ligustra cadunt, vaccīnia nigra leguntur “the white privet flowers fall, the dark vaccinia are gathered”.^[2][4]

Semantic evolution

What Virgil meant is uncertain: the OLD takes it as a dark-flowered plant like the marked hyacinth of Theocritus, perhaps an orchid,^[2] and Georges equates it with hyacinthus.^[3] In Vitruvius and Pliny the Elder it is a plant that gives a purple dye, probably the whortleberry or bilberry.^[2][5][6] It became the botanical name of the genus Vaccinium, and so English vaccinium.^[1]

Timeline

• 70–19 BC – Virgil names a dark flower with it.^[2][4]
• c. 84–c. 25 BC – Vitruvius uses it for a purple dye.^[2][4]
• 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder describes the plant.^[5][4]

Meanings

Noun

1. A dark-flowered plant in Virgil, variously identified as a kind of hyacinth or an orchid.^[2][3]
2. A plant yielding a purple dye, probably the whortleberry, or its berry.^[2][5][6]

Related words

• English vaccinium

References

1. ^ a b c d e 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 c Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
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 Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.