venatus

Forms

vēnātus m (genitive vēnātūs); fourth declension^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin vēnor (“to hunt”) + -tus.^[2][1][3] The verb probably comes from an adjective Proto-Italic *wēno- (“searching, hunting”) or a noun *wēnā- (“hunt”), made from Proto-Indo-European *(H)uēnh₁- (“desire”).^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

De Vaan and Köbler date it from Naevius.^[3][4]

Semantic evolution

It is the hunting of game, or a single hunt:^[2][5] Cicero speaks of toil in hunting, and Virgil and Ovid use it too, Ovid also in the plural.^[5] Plautus uses it of fishing, of a catch taken from the sea.^[5] Pliny the Elder uses it of the game itself, of peoples who live on game and fowling, and of an eagle bringing game to the girl who had raised it.^[2] Medieval Latin uses it of the right to hunt.^[6] Köbler finds it in a charter of 979.^[4]

Timeline

• c. 235–200 BC – Naevius.^[3][4]
• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus of fishing.^[5]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero of the toil of hunting.^[5]
• 23/24–79 AD – Pliny the Elder of game.^[2]
• 979 – In a charter.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. Hunting, the chase; a hunt.^[2][5][1]
2. Fishing; a catch.^[5]
3. Animals caught in hunting, game.^[2][5]
4. (Medieval Latin) The right to hunt.^[6]

Related words

• vēnor
• vēnātor
• vēnātiō
• vēnābulum

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d 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 Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
5. ^ a b c d e f g h Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill