Etymologically
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virens

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Forms

virēns (genitive virentis); third-declension participle[1][2]

Etymology

Used as an adjective, it is the present participle from Latin vireō (“to be green”).[1][2][3] De Vaan calls the etymology of the verb uncertain.[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Köbler dates it from Horace,[3] who has a green field and green ivy.[2][5]

Semantic evolution

It means green, of plants and growing things, as Horace's green ivy and Ovid's box tree green all the year;[5][2] Gellius uses it of the green sea.[5][2] Figuratively it means fresh with youth: Horace tells a boy not to scorn love while grey hair stays away from his green age, and Apuleius has boys and girls in their green youth.[5][2] As a neuter plural noun, virentia, it means green plants, in Columella and Seneca.[1][2][5] Stelten glosses it "green".[6]

Timeline

  • 65–8 BC – Horace of green ivy and of youth.[5][2][3]
  • 43 BC–18 AD – Ovid of the evergreen box tree.[5]
  • 1st century AD – Columella of green plants.[1][2]
  • c. 165 AD – Gellius of the green sea.[5][2]

Meanings

Adjective

  1. Green, growing green, verdant.[2][5][6]
  2. (figurative) Fresh, youthful, in the bloom of youth.[2][5]
  3. (neuter plural as noun) Green plants, herbage.[1][2]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
  3. ^ a b c Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
  4. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  6. ^ a b Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson