Reconstruction talk:Latin/circa

RFD discussion: June 2022–February 2023

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Reconstruction:Latin/circa

Attested. See circa#Latin. @Nicodene --Gowanw (talk) 20:39, 20 June 2022 (UTC)

Tagging: @Brutal Russian, PUC, Benwing2, Erutuon. --Gowanw (talk) 07:44, 24 June 2022 (UTC)

@Gowanw If you believe that the Vulgar Latin reconstructed noun *circa is attested, despite the cited sources on that entry, then find a citation or attestation. Nicodene (talk) 20:56, 20 June 2022 (UTC)

@Nicodene: Niermeyer, Jan Frederik (1976) “2. circa”, in Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden, Boston: E. J. Brill, page 180: “fossé autour d’un château — castle moat. Castrum, cercas et menadas suas. De Marca, Marca Hisp., app. col. 1083 (ch. a. 1041)” --Gowanw (talk) 01:07, 21 June 2022 (UTC)

@Gowanw The quote shows cercas and not *circa or *circas, so that already fails the first test. And what was "Attested. See circa#Latin" supposed to mean, when that entry contains no mention whatsoever of such a noun? [Edit: the user added the Medieval Latin noun 2.5 hours after this comment and copy-pasted my citations and descendants.]

Cercas is, straightforwardly, a borrowing from Catalan; cf. the menadas right next to it (etymologically minātās). Latin documents from 11th-century Catalonia are chock-full of Romance words, for which see e.g. the Manual of Catalan Linguistics, chapter 10. Nicodene (talk) 01:31, 21 June 2022 (UTC)

@Nicodene: Attested vulgarized Latin is still attested. To cite it as a reconstruction is inaccurate. @Metaknowledge, Ungoliant MMDCCLXIV, Rua --Gowanw (talk) 03:29, 21 June 2022 (UTC)

@Gowanw If only what you had was actually Vulgar Latin, rather than a mid-11th century Medieval Latin text with Romance loanwords. You do understand that the Oaths of Strasbourg were written two centuries before, yes? There is no 'Vulgar Latin' by this point: there is Romance.

Vulgar Latin *circa is mentioned, with the asterisk, by the TLFi and Coromines and Pascual. You may direct any complaints to them. Nicodene (talk) 03:48, 21 June 2022 (UTC)

Please take note of Category:Medieval Latin. --Gowanw (talk) 04:01, 21 June 2022 (UTC)

@Gowanw What about it?

Edit: I see you have decided to change 'attested Vulgar Latin' to 'attested vulgarized Latin'. You are right to (quietly) acknowledge the difference. The Vulgar Latin that etymological dictionaries refer to is the language from which Romance had developed by, at the very latest, 842 CE, and likely long before. It is not the same as Latin from the second millennium with loanwords sprinkled in. Nicodene (talk) 05:45, 21 June 2022 (UTC)

@Nicodene: Please read Wiktionary:About_Vulgar_Latin#Spelling. On the project, we adjust vulgarized Latin to conform to classical spellings, regardless of the vowel quality at the time of attestation (Tagging @J3133). I was trying to point out that if you look at the entries in Category:Medieval Latin, like parricus, the word very likely existed pre-ML, but is only attested later. Regardless, the entry for it -- and perhaps most importantly -- its descendants, reside at a Medieval Latin entry. --Gowanw (talk) 18:01, 21 June 2022 (UTC)

This is a loanword from Catalan cerca, not Vulgar Latin. J3133 (talk) 18:11, 21 June 2022 (UTC)

@J3133: 1. Where it's taken from is inconsequential. 2. Correct, it is only attested in ML. --Gowanw (talk) 18:54, 21 June 2022 (UTC)

I.e., Cerca, not circa. Read Nicodene’s reply below. J3133 (talk) 18:57, 21 June 2022 (UTC)

@Gowanw Please read Wiktionary:About Vulgar Latin#Spelling yourself and notice that the policy applies to Vulgar Latin (which, as it notes, mostly refers to reconstructed entries) and not to Medieval Latin, nor to "vulgarized Latin", whatever that is supposed to mean. Both of the sources that you cited were, fittingly enough, Medieval Latin dictionaries.

Even the policy page that you have cited contains the same chronological observation that I have made above: 'By the time the first texts were written in the vernacular around the 9th century, they were no longer recognisably Latin, but had already evolved to become the individual Romance languages in their early forms.'

As for your observation that the term in question 'very likely existed pre-ML, but is only attested later' - you have just explained why I, along with the aforementioned sources, provide the Vulgar Latin form with an asterisk. Nicodene (talk) 18:38, 21 June 2022 (UTC)

Strong keep. The Romance noun doesn't descend from the Latin adverb / preposition; they should not be confused.--Ser be être 是^talk/stalk 22:16, 20 June 2022 (UTC)

Should be deleted. It would be confusing to mention the same word once starred and once unstarred, or link at different places. It’s still the same word even if in all attestations it is borrowed from its descendants, I don’t take the position that because language B descends from an earlier state of language A any words in B which descend from A but are only attested from later or even causated by B we should star the attested word—it is quite arbitrary, depending on our chronolect cut and whether we are sure a word existed at a certain time, thus motivating us to star a word only by a factor in (a) different language(s); for example, hypothetically, why do we have to have a starred Latin *birra (“beer”) if the Italian turns out to be very early in the vulgar tongue of Italy? Instead, you have to be explicit about this peculiar situation, at the unstarred entry—the starring practice is a rough idea and not made for this. Fay Freak (talk) 18:59, 21 June 2022 (UTC)

As someone not versed in Latin, if this entry is Vulgar Latin, shouldn't it have that label? Or am I misinterpreting something? Sorry it's kinda confusing to follow. AG202 (talk) 19:11, 21 June 2022 (UTC)

Wiktionary treats any reconstructed Latin entry as 'Vulgar Latin' (coded as VL.; in this case {{m|VL.|*circa}}). In practice, most of the entries are more precisely Proto-Romance, Proto-Italo-Western Romance, etc. and often labelled as such, one way or another.

@Fay Freak I don't think I understand. Does Wiktionary allow intentionally wrong derivation sequences? And what would be wrong with noting this on the starred entry? 'The Romance form subsequently surfaced, in the plural form ⟨cercas⟩, in a single Medieval Latin document in 11th century Catalonia, alongside other borrowings from Romance.' Nicodene (talk) 19:30, 21 June 2022 (UTC)

@Nicodene: This all does not solve the issue that we have two entries and the asterisk is not specific for such a situation, where some reader might wonder why we “still have a starred link when the term is entered as attested”. We don’t make “wrong derivation sequences” therefore, in so far as we regard the overall situation. Instead, the word is partly attested in a language and partly not, odd! Cutting all into additional languages like “Proto-Romance”, “Proto-Italo-Western Romance” etc., conceptually or by actual language headers, won’t help but only introduce complication. Fay Freak (talk) 19:39, 21 June 2022 (UTC)

'Proto-Romance' and such are optional labels buried within the reconstructed entries (and if you don't like them, I really would not mind removing them). The only thing that displays in a descendants or etymology section is 'Vulgar Latin', with an asterisk. The real division is between what is reconstructed for the era and what is actually attested.

Anyway, if there existed an etymological dictionary describing even one of the Romance words as 'derived from Medieval Latin circa "enclosure"', I would not mind adding it as such, even without an attestation and despite the other aforementioned points. Nicodene (talk) 20:24, 21 June 2022 (UTC)

@Nicodene: That’s why we don’t write this. We write e.g. “derived from Vulgar Latin unstarred word that is attested in Latin but later”, per my suggestion. It is an interesting take that you think that the star should be used because of it not being attested in Vulgar Latin specifically. But we can of course express the same thing more circumstantially like “derived from a Vulgar Latin term only attested later as word that is attested in Latin but later”, and yet the issue of having two pages seems weighty enough for me to overlook this detail of linking a Vulgar Latin word unstarred in spite of it being attested but later. Some jokester may also point out that Italian and Spanish is Vulgar Latin so this is all too trifling: the major point is too link Latin starred if completely unattested and unstarred if anyhow attested rather than reconstructed, according to which our division of mainspace and reconstruction space is made, a dichotomy which hardly can be made perfectly further fine-grained: the stars are for the whole language, not its subdivisions, which we unify. Unless you want to introduce another sign to solve a Wiktionary-specific problem: Suppose we link Latin 🪅circa, using the piñata to mark to the system that it should link the mainspace and to the reader of etymology sections that the word is not attested within the mentioned sublanguage but the whole language, so we can have but one page and technically totally correct derivation sequences. Fay Freak (talk) 22:35, 21 June 2022 (UTC)

'It is an interesting take that you think that the star should be used because of it not being attested in Vulgar Latin specifically'

It isn't 'my take': the aforecited etymological dictionaries specify 'a Vulgar Latin *circa'. Really the entire RFD is invalidated by that, but here we are.

'But we can of course express the same thing more circumstantially like “derived from a Vulgar Latin term only attested later as word that is attested in Latin but later”'

'From Vulgar Latin *circa 'enclosure', corresponding to the Romance borrowing cercas found in a later Medieval Latin text' would seem fine to me.

'and yet the issue of having two pages seems weighty enough for me to overlook this detail of linking a Vulgar Latin word unstarred in spite of it being attested but later. Some jokester may also point out that Italian and Spanish is Vulgar Latin so this is all too trifling

Needless to say, I have the opposite views on what is 'trifling' here and what is 'weighty'.

'the major point is too link Latin starred if completely unattested and unstarred if anyhow attested rather than reconstructed, according to which our division of mainspace and reconstruction space is made, a dichotomy which hardly can be made perfectly further fine-grained: the stars are for the whole language, not its subdivisions, which we unify.'

While we're at it, let's go ahead and delete the Vulgar Latin *miraclum 'mirror' (which might as well have been spelled *miraculum) and move all the descendants to Latin miraculum 'miracle', since the latter is attested and since Wiktionary doesn't have time for these trivial distinctions. We even have one (1) attestation of a Medieval Latin mirale with the sense of 'mirror'. So what if it's a late borrowing of Occitan miralh? Details, details... It's all just Latin in the end anyway. Nicodene (talk) 01:17, 22 June 2022 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Latin/miraclum should absolutely be deleted. @Nicodene, you seem to be stuck on how you would do things and not how the project does things. --Gowanw (talk) 21:03, 22 June 2022 (UTC)

@Gowanw No, it absolutely should not be. It is not the same thing as Classical Latin miraculum 'miracle' just because both derive from the Latin verb mirari (“gaze at”). It means 'mirror'. Cf. the DCVB, which clearly distinguishes the reconstructed Vulgar Latin term (marked with an asterisk) from the Classical Latin term. Just because you, personally, don't understand or don't care about the difference does not mean it should be deleted from Wiktionary. Nicodene (talk) 21:11, 22 June 2022 (UTC)

You're aware we can have multiple etymologies on a single page, correct? --Gowanw (talk) 21:33, 22 June 2022 (UTC)

@Gowanw You're aware that one of the terms is reconstructed, correct? How do you imagine having them on the same entry? Lying by pretending that miraculum 'mirror' is attested in Latin? Nicodene (talk) 21:42, 22 June 2022 (UTC)

By his logic the reconstructed template itself should be deleted as it isn't how the project does things. Oigolue (talk) 21:49, 22 June 2022 (UTC)

The key point is being missed is: we have one single header for Latin, which is why standardize *all* Latin entries to Classical Latin. @Nicodene, you created your reconstruction as **miraclum, but it's just syncopated variant of miraculum. What you're reconstructing is not the form, but the meaning and etymology, and for that purpose, they should be in a single entry. --Gowanw (talk) 03:44, 23 June 2022 (UTC)

@Gowanw I wonder what gave you the impression that putting a reconstructed and unattested noun in an attested entry is anything resembling standard practice.

'you created your reconstruction as **miraclum, but it's just syncopated variant of miraculum'

Wrong. It is simply another way of writing *miraculum 'mirror', which is a reconstruction (and not even mine). The difference has already been explained to you. Pretending it doesn't exist won't make it go away. Nicodene (talk) 03:53, 23 June 2022 (UTC)

The problem isn't having multiple etymologies on the same page, the problem is that catalan mirall and its cognates come from vulgar latin *miraclum, not classical latin miraculum. As you can see they are different forms, also written differently, not just the same word with different etimologies or some kind of alt form or whatever. It's not about how @Nicodene or i or anyone would do things, it's about how Romance and Latin linguistics do it. And they do it just the same way we do and everyone on this page did for Vulgar Latin terms until you started this, without having solid knowledge of the topic, which is what you have proven for days on many answers and edits related to this. And if Romance and Latin linguistics do this it's for a reason, not bc they just want. You may know the project well, but without fundamental knowledge about a certain topic, you can't know how this topic can adapt to the project and vice-versa. Oigolue (talk) 21:46, 22 June 2022 (UTC)

Aha, thank you. Yeah, I don't even think this entry is categorized as "Vulgar Latin" without the label, unlike *palatium. That's personally where my confusion arose. AG202 (talk) 19:50, 21 June 2022 (UTC)

• RFD-kept. No consensus for deletion, eight months since last comment. Nicodene (talk) 00:35, 18 February 2023 (UTC)