murcus
Appearance
Latin
[edit]Etymology
[edit]Unknown. The Hesychius hapax Ancient Greek μύρκος (múrkos), μυρικᾶς (murikâs, “mute, dumb”), transmitted as being used in Syracuse, is deemed by Oikonomos, Ernout/Meillet and Beekes borrowed from Latin. Connection to murgisō (“shrewd shyster”), Old Armenian մրգուզ (mrguz, “vile, despicable”) seems promising, however the -cus part reoccurs in broccus (“having broken teeth”), mancus (“maimed, crippled”), caecus (“blind”).
Pronunciation
[edit]- (Classical Latin) IPA(key): /ˈmur.kus/, [ˈmʊrkʊs̠]
- (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA(key): /ˈmur.kus/, [ˈmurkus]
Noun
[edit]murcus m (genitive murcī); second declension (very rare)
- shortened, mutilated
- 8–9th C. CE, Glossarium Amplonianum primum in Corpus Glossariorum Latinorum (volume V), Georg Goetz, Bibliotheca Teubneriana, Leipzig 1888, page 371, line 19:
- murcus curtus
- 8–9th C. CE, Glossarium Amplonianum primum in Corpus Glossariorum Latinorum (volume V), Georg Goetz, Bibliotheca Teubneriana, Leipzig 1888, page 371, line 19:
- (military) a coward, who, to escape military service, cuts off his thumb
- c. 390 CE, Ammianus Marcellinus, Res Gestae 15.12.3:
- Nec eōrum aliquandō quisquam ut in Italiā mūnus Mārtium pertimēscēns pollicem sibi praecidit, quōs locāliter murcōs appellant.
- Neither are there among them any who, fearing military duty, cuts off, as in Italy, his thumb, which they regionally call murcī.
- Nec eōrum aliquandō quisquam ut in Italiā mūnus Mārtium pertimēscēns pollicem sibi praecidit, quōs locāliter murcōs appellant.
Declension
[edit]Second-declension noun.
singular | plural | |
---|---|---|
nominative | murcus | murcī |
genitive | murcī | murcōrum |
dative | murcō | murcīs |
accusative | murcum | murcōs |
ablative | murcō | murcīs |
vocative | murce | murcī |
Derived terms
[edit]References
[edit]- “murcus”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
- murcus in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
- Ernout, Alfred, Meillet, Antoine (1985) “murcus”, in Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue latine: histoire des mots[1] (in French), 4th edition, with additions and corrections of Jacques André, Paris: Klincksieck, published 2001, page 422b
- “murcus” in volume 8, column 1670, line 54 in the Thesaurus Linguae Latinae (TLL Open Access), Berlin (formerly Leipzig): De Gruyter (formerly Teubner), 1900–present