puerpera Latin · revision 34741

+ {{infobox|confidence=established|formation=compound|attested=c. 200 BC, Plautus|origins=la puer, la pariō}}

+

+ ==Pronunciation==

+ * Classical: [puˈɛr.pɛ.ra]^(Wiktionary)

+ * Ecclesiastical: [puˈɛr.pe.ra]^(Wiktionary)

+

+ ==Forms==

+ '''puerpera''' ''f'' (genitive puerperae); first declension^(Wiktionary)

+

+ ==Etymology==

+ It is the feminine of an adjective [[m|la|puerperus|t=bearing children]] used as a noun,^(TLL)^(Wiktionary) [[af|la|puer|pariō|t1=boy, child|t2=to give birth]].^(OLD 2012)^(TLL)

+

+ Ancient scholars explained the name in several ways: the jurist Paulus says that the word for boy covers girls as well, so that women recently delivered bear this name;^(TLL) Priscian says it is a woman who bears a boy or a girl;^(TLL) Isidore of Seville offers both that women are weighed down by a first birth and that they give birth in their youthful years.^(TLL)

+

+ ==Earliest recorded meaning==

+ Köbler records it first in Plautus,^(Köbler 2010) who uses it in the ''Amphitryon'';^(Conte 2010) Georges notes that Plautus and Catullus use it of a woman in labour.^(Georges 1913)

+

+ ==Semantic evolution==

+ It is a woman who has just given birth, or one in the course of delivery: Terence uses it of a woman in childbed, and Plautus and Catullus of one in labour.^(Georges 1913)^(OLD 2012) According to the TLL, it occurs in verse from Plautus on and in prose from Seneca the Elder.^(TLL) Seneca the Younger uses it attributively, ''uxor puerpera'', and Pliny the Elder uses it too.^(Georges 1913)^(Conte 2010)

+

+ In Christian and Medieval Latin it also meant a mother,^(Stelten 1995) and the ''sacra puerpera'' was the Virgin Mary.^(DMLBS) Aldhelm gives one of his riddles the title of a woman who has given birth to twins.^(DMLBS)

+

+ ==Timeline==

+ * c. 250–184 BC – Plautus uses it of a woman in labour.^(Georges 1913)^(Köbler 2010)

+ * 190–159 BC – Terence uses it of a woman in childbed.^(Georges 1913)

+ * 81/79–52/50 BC – Catullus uses it of women in labour.^(Georges 1913)^(Conte 2010)

+ * 4 BC–65 AD – Seneca uses it attributively, ''uxor puerpera''.^(Georges 1913)

+ * 639–709 AD – Aldhelm uses it in the title of a riddle.^(DMLBS)

+

+ ==Meanings==

+ ===Noun===

+ # A woman who has just been [[m|en|delivered]] of a child, a woman in [[m|en|childbed]].^(OLD 2012)^(Georges 1913)

+ # A woman in [[m|en|labour]].^(OLD 2012)^(Georges 1913)

+ # ''(Ecclesiastical Latin)'' A [[m|en|mother]];^(Stelten 1995)^(DMLBS) ''sacra puerpera'', the Virgin Mary.^(Stelten 1995)^(DMLBS)

+

+ ==Related words==

+ * [[puerperium]]

+ * [[puer]]

+ * [[pariō]]

+

+ ==References==

+ {{reflist}}