zona

Pronunciation

• IPA (Classical): [ˈzoː.na]^[1]
• IPA (Ecclesiastical): [ˈd͡zɔː.na]^[1]

Forms

zōna f (genitive zōnae); first declension^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ancient Greek ζώνη (zṓnē, “belt, girdle”).^[2][3][1] The Greek word comes from Proto-Indo-European *yoh₃snéh₂, from Proto-Indo-European *yeh₃s- (“to gird”).^[1][4] Isidore of Seville already called it a Greek word, equal to Latin cingulum.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Plautus uses it of a man's girdle, in a line where someone is told to take a tunic and a girdle.^[2][4] Köbler dates Plautus c. 250–184 BC.^[4] One Plautine manuscript reading has the spelling sōna.^[6]

Semantic evolution

It was a girdle worn by men to hold up the tunic, often with a pouch for money, and a woman's girdle; a girl's girdle stood for her virginity, so to loosen it meant to lose it, as in Catullus.^[2][7] From the astronomers it took the sense of the five bands circling the sky and the earth, in Virgil's quinque tenent caelum zonae.^[2][8] It was also any encircling band, as on onyx in Pliny, and in Scribonius Largus the illness shingles.^[2]

In medieval British Latin it was still a belt or girdle, and also a girth for a horse.^[9] English zone is recorded in the late 14th century as a belt, from the Latin geographical and celestial sense.^[10]

Timeline

• c. 250–184 BC – Plautus uses it of a man's girdle.^[2][4]
• 81/79–52/50 BC – Catullus uses the loosened girdle for loss of virginity.^[2][4]
• 70–19 BC – Virgil names the five celestial zones.^[2][4]
• c. 47 AD – Scribonius Largus uses it of shingles.^[2][4]
• late 14th century – Borrowed into English as zone.^[10]

Meanings

Noun

1. A girdle or belt worn by men, often holding money.^[2][6]
2. A woman's girdle; a girl's girdle as a sign of virginity.^[2][7]
3. One of the five zones of the sky and earth.^[2][8]
4. An encircling band or marking.^[2]
5. (medicine) shingles.^[2]
6. (Medieval Latin) A girth for a horse.^[9]

Word family

• zōnālis
• zōnārius
• zōnātim
• zōnula
• septizōnium

Related words

• cingulum
• English zone

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ Saalfeld, Günther Alexander (1874), Index Graecorum vocabulorum in linguam latinam translatorum, Berlin: Weidmann
4. ^ a b c d e f g Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
5. ^ Isidore of Seville, Etymologiarum sive Originum libri XX, ed. W. M. Lindsay (Oxford, 1911).
6. ^ a b Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ a b Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
8. ^ a b Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
9. ^ a b Latham, R. E., D. R. Howlett, R. K. Ashdowne, et al. (1975–2013), Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources, London: British Academy / Oxford University Press
10. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com