Etymologically
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vitrum

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Pronunciation

  • Classical: [ˈwɪ.trũː][1]
  • Ecclesiastical: [ˈviː.trum][1]

Forms

vitrum n (genitive vitrī); second declension[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Proto-Italic *wedro- (“glass”), from Proto-Indo-European *wed-ro- (“water-like”), as Szemerényi proposed after a Middle Iranian parallel in which the word for glass comes from the word for water; de Vaan accepts this and relates it to unda (“wave”).[2] He thinks the plant woad and its dye were named after the colour of ancient glass, a pale, transparent green.[2] The OLD instead gives the woad as a separate entry, compared with Old High German weit (“woad”) and Old English wād (“woad”), and calls the origin of the word for glass doubtful, perhaps the same.[3] Lewis & Short connected it with videō (“to see”), as something transparent.[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

De Vaan dates it from Lucretius,[2] and Cicero uses it in the speech for Rabirius Postumus.[4][5] Caesar has the woad,[5][3] a dye Wiktionary describes as used by the Britons.[1]

Semantic evolution

It is glass and also a glass vessel: the Copa has someone rinse with a glass, and Pliny the Elder mentions cooling water in glass in snow.[3] Horace calls the spring of Bandusia clearer than glass, and Martial has someone drink from glass.[4] Pliny the Elder describes its making.[4] As woad it is the plant Isatis tinctoria or the blue dye from its leaves.[3][1] Stelten gives “glass”.[6] The English words vitreous and vitrify come from its family.[7]

Timeline

  • 96–55 BC – Lucretius.[2][5]
  • 81–43 BC – Cicero, of glassware.[4][5]
  • c. 50 BC – Caesar, of the Britons' woad.[5]
  • 65–8 BC – Horace, “clearer than glass”.[4][5]

Meanings

Noun

  1. Glass; a glass vessel.[3][4][1]
  2. Woad, the plant Isatis tinctoria; the blue dye made from it.[3][1]

Word family

  • unda
  • English vitreous
  • English vitrify

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ 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
  3. ^ a b c d e f Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  4. ^ a b c d e f g Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  5. ^ a b c d e f Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
  6. ^ Stelten, Leo F. (1995), Dictionary of Ecclesiastical Latin, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson
  7. ^ Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com