Quirites

See also: quirites

English

Etymology

From Latin Quirītēs.

Proper noun

Quirites

  1. (historical) The citizens of early Rome.

Latin

Etymology

Uncertain. A common proposal is Proto-Italic *kom + *wiros (fellow man), which De Vaan (2008) rejects by contrasting the phonetic evolution in cūria, yet doesn't settle on an etymon.[1] Against this, Vine (2016) suggests that the two words could simply stem from periods of different stress, so that different syllables underwent vowel reduction: /kowiˈriː-/ > /kʷiˈriː-/ like Late Latin quāgulum from coāgulum.[2]

According to a Roman legend, from the Sabine town, Curēs, which would make it a Sabine loanword. In Ancient Greek the inhabitants of Cures were named Κυρῖται (Kurîtai).

Compare Ancient Greek Κούρητες (Koúrētes).

Pronunciation

Proper noun

Quirītēs m pl (genitive Quirītium or Quirītum); third declension

  1. The endonym of the Romans in their civil capacity, while Rōmānī referred to them in a political and military capacity.
  2. (very rare, poetic) the inhabitants of the Sabine town, Cures

Declension

Third-declension noun (i-stem or imparisyllabic non-i-stem), plural only.

plural
nominative Quirītēs
genitive Quirītium
Quirītum
dative Quirītibus
accusative Quirītēs
Quirītīs
ablative Quirītibus
vocative Quirītēs

References

  1. ^ De Vaan, Michiel (2008), “quirīs, -ītis”, in Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages (Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series; 7), Leiden, Boston: Brill, →ISBN, page 509
  2. ^ Brent Vine (2016), “"Latin bēs/bessis 'two thirds of an as'"”, in Tavet Tat Satyam: Studies in Honor of Jared S. Klein on the Occasion of His Seventieth Birthday[1], page 327

Further reading

  • Quirites”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  • Quirites”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891), An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
  • "Quirites", in Charles du Fresne du Cange, Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition with additions by D. P. Carpenterius, Adelungius and others, edited by Léopold Favre, 1883–1887)
  • Quirites”, in Gaffiot, Félix (1934), Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.