vicinia

Forms

vīcīnia f (genitive vīcīniae); first declension^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin vīcīnus (“near, neighbouring”) + -ia.^[2][1] De Vaan lists both vīcīnus and vīcīnia among the derivatives of vīcus (“village, street”), which he traces to Proto-Italic *weik-o- (“settlement”) and Proto-Indo-European *weiḱ- (“settlement”).^[3] Among the cognates of vīcus he names Ancient Greek οἶκος (oîkos, “house”).^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Plautus has it first, of someone who lives in the house next door: proxumae viciniae habitat, “he lives in the nearest neighbourhood”.^[2][3][4]

Semantic evolution

It is first the area around a place, the neighbourhood, and by metonymy the people who live there: Horace imagines the neighbourhood praising a fine funeral.^[2] It is also nearness itself, as when Ovid says that the lover could not bear the closeness of his mistress.^[2] Later writers extend it to time and likeness: Lucan has men close to death, and Seneca those who stand near wisdom without yet having it.^[2] Lewis & Short note that it is mostly poetic and post-Augustan, and refer to vīcīnitās beside it.^[4] In Medieval Latin it also meant a region or its surroundings, a rural community, and the village assembly or court.^[5]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus of the house next door.^[2][6]
• 65–8 BC – Horace of the neighbours as a group.^[2][6]
• 4 BC–65 AD – Seneca the Younger of nearness to wisdom.^[2][6]
• Middle Ages – a village community and its assembly.^[5]

Meanings

Noun

1. Neighbourhood, the area around a place; vicinity.^[2][4][1]
2. The people of a neighbourhood, neighbours.^[2]
3. Nearness, proximity; closeness in time.^[2][1]
4. Similarity, approximation.^[2]
5. (Medieval Latin) A region, the surrounding country.^[5]
6. (Medieval Latin) A village community; the assembly or court of a village.^[5]

References

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