indignitas Latin · revision 32442

+ {{infobox|confidence=established|formation=derivation|attested=Rhetorica ad Herennium|origins=ine-pro *deḱ-no-}}

+

+ ==Forms==

+ '''indignitās''' ''f'' (genitive indignitātis); third declension^(Wiktionary)

+

+ ==Etymology==

+ It is [[af|la|indignus|-tās|t1=unworthy]].^(OLD 2012)^(Wiktionary)^(TLL) [[m|la|indignus]] is the negative of [[m|la|dignus|t=worthy]], which de Vaan traces to [[itc-pro|*dek-no-|t=worthy]] and [[ine-pro|*deḱ-no-]], a derivative of the root of [[m|la|decet|t=it is fitting]].^(de Vaan 2008)

+

+ ==Earliest recorded meaning==

+ The TLL records it from the ''Rhetorica ad Herennium'' and Cicero on; the treatise's author says he cannot put the outrageousness of the deed into words.^(TLL)^(OLD 2012)

+

+ ==Semantic evolution==

+ It is the quality of being unworthy: of actions, shamefulness or outrageousness, and of people, lack of merit or baseness, as when Cicero sets a man's worth against his unworthiness.^(OLD 2012)^(Lewis & Short 1879) It is also unworthy treatment, an indignity or humiliation, and the feeling it causes: Cicero writes of having endured all the indignity and trouble of approaching a powerful man, and asks whether his own indignation can stay silent.^(OLD 2012) Church Latin glosses it unworthiness, baseness.^(Stelten 1995)

+

+ ==Timeline==

+ * 81–43 BC – Cicero of baseness and of humiliation.^(OLD 2012)^(Köbler 2010)

+ * 1580s – English [[m|en|indignity]] is borrowed from it.^(Etymonline)

+

+ ==Meanings==

+ ===Noun===

+ # Unworthiness; of acts, shamefulness, outrageousness; of persons, baseness, [[m|en|vileness]].^(OLD 2012)^(Lewis & Short 1879)^(Stelten 1995)^(Wiktionary)

+ # Unworthy treatment, an [[m|en|indignity]], [[m|en|humiliation]].^(OLD 2012)^(Wiktionary)

+ # A sense of indignity, [[m|en|indignation]].^(OLD 2012)

+

+ ==Related words==

+ * [[indignus]]

+ * [[dignitas|alt=dignitās]]

+

+ ==References==

+ {{reflist}}