contagium Latin · revision 6246

16 Oct 2026, 05:42 by bogdan “New Latin entry (sources: de Vaan, OLD, Lewis & Short, TLL...)” current version
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+ {{infobox|confidence=established|formation=derivation|attested=Lucretius|origins=la tangō}}
+ 
+ ==Forms==
+ '''contāgium''' ''n'' (genitive contāgiī or contāgī); second declension^(Wiktionary)
+ 
+ ==Etymology==
+ It is from the root of [[contingō]] “to touch”, from [[con-]] and [[tangō]], with the suffix [[-ium]], as a byform of [[contāgiō]]; like it, it lacks the nasal of the present stem.^(OLD 2012)^(Wiktionary)
+ 
+ ==Earliest recorded meaning==
+ The OLD's first citations are from Lucretius, of contact and of the infection of disease.^(OLD 2012) Köbler dates Lucretius 96–55 BC.^(Köbler 2010)
+ 
+ ==Semantic evolution==
+ It was at first used only in the plural, as a poetic form of ''contāgiō''; the singular appears in Curtius and Seneca.^(OLD 2012) It meant touching, contact, and contact that passes on an infection, as Lucretius' disease penetrating the mind and Virgil's infection from a neighbour's flock, and infection with any evil, as Horace's and Ovid's influence of a sick mind.^(OLD 2012)^(Gaffiot 2016) Döderlein says [[luēs]] is an epidemic as morbid matter, ''contāgium'' as contagious, and [[pestilentia]] as a disease prevailing in the land.^(Döderlein 1874)
+ 
+ In Ecclesiastical Latin it meant contagion, temptation.^(Stelten 1995) In Medieval Latin it meant contact and contagion, also figuratively.^(DMLBS) [[en|contagium]] was borrowed, and [[en|contagion]] comes from ''contāgiō''.^(Wiktionary)^(Etymonline)
+ 
+ ==Timeline==
+ * 96–55 BC – Lucretius uses it of infection.^(OLD 2012)^(Köbler 2010)
+ * 70–19 BC – Virgil uses it of infection from a flock.^(OLD 2012)^(Köbler 2010)
+ * 65–8 BC – Horace uses it of moral pollution.^(OLD 2012)^(Köbler 2010)
+ 
+ ==Meanings==
+ ===Noun===
+ # Touch, [[m|en|contact]].^(OLD 2012)
+ # [[m|en|Infection]], [[m|en|contagion]].^(OLD 2012)
+ # Pollution, corrupting influence.^(OLD 2012)
+ 
+ ==Word family==
+ * [[contāgiōsus]]
+ 
+ ==Related words==
+ * [[contāgiō]]
+ * [[contingō]]
+ * [[tangō]]
+ * [[en|contagion]]
+ 
+ ==References==
+ {{reflist}}