scopa Latin · revision 36765

+ {{infobox|confidence=probable|formation=inherited|attested=c. 235–200 BC, Naevius|origins=itc-pro *skōp-ā-}}

+

+ ==Pronunciation==

+ * Classical: [ˈskoː.pa]^(Wiktionary)

+ * Ecclesiastical: [ˈskɔː.pa]^(Wiktionary)

+

+ ==Forms==

+ '''scōpa''' ''f'' (genitive scōpae); first declension^(Wiktionary)

+ The word is nearly always plural, ''scōpae'', ''scōpārum'', and Varro and Quintilian cite it as a noun with no singular.^(OLD 2012)^(Lewis & Short 1879)

+ The singular occurs in the plant name ''scōpa rēgia'' and in the Vulgate.^(OLD 2012)^(Georges 1913)

+

+ ==Etymology==

+ It is [[inh|itc-pro|*skōp-ā-]].^(de Vaan 2008) De Vaan compares [[grc|σκᾶπος|tr=skâpos|t=stick]] (in Hesychius), [[m|grc|σκήπτομαι|tr=skḗptomai|t=to support oneself]], [[lv|šķèps|t=spear, javelin]], [[goh|skaft|t=shaft]] and [[non|skapt|t=shaft]].^(de Vaan 2008) He suggests that the Latin and Greek words could go back to ablaut forms of [[ine-pro|*sk(e/o)h₂p-]], but notes that no verb of that root is attested, so they might also be borrowings, perhaps independent ones.^(de Vaan 2008) Wiktionary derives it from [[m|ine-pro|*skeh₂p-|t=to prop]],^(Wiktionary) and the OLD calls it cognate with [[scāpus]] “stalk, shaft”.^(OLD 2012)

+

+ ==Earliest recorded meaning==

+ De Vaan dates it from Naevius,^(de Vaan 2008) and Georges records the plural for the twigs or sprigs of plants such as wormwood and asparagus, in Naevius and Pliny the Elder.^(Georges 1913)^(Köbler 2010)

+

+ ==Semantic evolution==

+ The first sense is branches or sprigs of a plant, usually tied together, and above all tied into a [[m|en|broom]].^(OLD 2012) Plautus already has a character call for brooms to sweep away the spiders' work,^(OLD 2012) and Horace, Petronius and Martial use the word for a household broom.^(OLD 2012)^(Lewis & Short 1879) Pliny the Elder notes that country brooms were made from the sharp-leaved ''oxymyrsinē''.^(OLD 2012)

+

+ A broom that is untied is useless, and this gave proverbial phrases: Cicero says that those who break up the structure of a speech “untie the broom” (''scōpās dissolvere''), and he says that Lucius Caesar, who came to him with absurd messages, was not a man but ''scōpae solūtae'', “an untied broom”.^(OLD 2012)^(Georges 1913) The phrase ''scōpa rēgia'' named the shrub butcher's broom in Scribonius Largus and Pliny, and in the plural an aromatic plant.^(OLD 2012)

+

+ Medieval writers used it for a bundle of twigs, a birch for punishment and a broom;^(DMLBS) Bede insists that it is always plural, and it was also the name of the birch tree.^(DMLBS)

+

+ ==Timeline==

+ * c. 235–200 BC – Naevius uses it.^(de Vaan 2008)^(Köbler 2010)

+ * c. 250–184 BC – Plautus uses it for brooms.^(OLD 2012)^(Köbler 2010)

+ * 81–43 BC – Cicero quotes the proverb of the untied broom.^(OLD 2012)^(Köbler 2010)

+ * before 66 AD – Petronius tells of silver swept up with the rubbish.^(OLD 2012)^(Köbler 2010)

+ * 390–406 AD – The Vulgate uses the singular.^(Georges 1913)^(Köbler 2010)

+

+ ==Meanings==

+ ===Noun===

+ # ''(usually plural)'' Twigs, sprigs or branches of a plant, usually tied together.^(OLD 2012)^(Lewis & Short 1879)

+ # ''(plural)'' A [[m|en|broom]], [[m|en|besom]].^(OLD 2012)^(Lewis & Short 1879)

+ # ''scōpae solūtae'': “an untied broom”, a useless person;^(OLD 2012)^(Georges 1913) ''scōpās dissolvere'', to undo something well ordered.^(OLD 2012)^(Georges 1913)

+ # ''scōpa rēgia'': the shrub [[m|en|butcher's broom]].^(OLD 2012)

+ # ''(Medieval Latin)'' A [[m|en|birch]] for punishment; the birch tree.^(DMLBS)

+

+ ==Word family==

+ * [[scōpārius]]

+ * [[scopō]]

+ * [[scōpula]]

+ * [[scōpīlia]]

+

+ ==Related words==

+ * [[scāpus]]

+ * [[scīpiō]]

+

+ ==Usage notes==

+ A separate, rare word ''scopa'', with a short ''o'', is the Greek [[m|grc|σκοπή|tr=skopḗ|t=lookout, observation]], used once by Martianus Capella in the sense of an observation or theory.^(Georges 1913)^(Gaffiot 2016)^(Lewis & Short 1879)^(Köbler 2010)

+

+ ==References==

+ {{reflist}}