Latin verbs = English words

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

The recent news story about placebos got me thinking. Placebo means “I shall please” in Latin. There are a great many English words that come directly from Latin nouns without change of spelling (e.g., cerebellum, gladiolus). But there aren’t many English words that come directly from Latin verbs without change of spelling. I don’t count participles, gerunds, or gerundives (so not agenda, innuendo, pudendum, or referendum). I don’t count English words that are spelled the same as Latin verbs by coincidence only (such as it, sum,, and fit). I don’t count phrases (so not nolo contendere or habeas corpus) I admit some of the words in my list don’t come directly from the Latin verb, so I’ll make two lists
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English words that come directly from Latin verbs
caveat - let him beware
exeunt - they go out
exit - he goes out
imprimatur - let it be printed
mandamus - we command
nocebo - I shall harm
placebo - I shall please
recipe - take (imperative)
veto - I forbid
video - I see

English words that are from Latin verbs, and spelled the same, but whose eytmology is complicated
audio - I hear (actually from the prefix “audio-”)
circuit - it encircles (actually from Latin circuitus via French)
credit - it lends, he believes, etc. (actually from Latin creditum)
edit - he published (actually backformation of “editor”)
radio - I shine (actually a clipped form of “radiotelegraphy”)
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I’m sure there must be more. Anyone?

2

habitat: it dwells.

Do you count infinitives? That (I think) would permit certiorari: “to get informed”.

3

Magnificat: it magnifies.

4

Magnificat, though, is sort of a special case because it’s just used to refer to a particular text (or a musical setting of it) by means of the first word in it (which is common with ecclesiastical documents written in Latin – Bible passages, parts of the Mass, papal bulls, and so forth). In this case, the passage starts Magnificat anima mea Dominum…

As far as the OP is concerned:

credo - I believe.

5

Thank you for my first Latin lesson.

6

Well, I figured because a piece of music (say) is still a magnificat (common noun!) whether or not it has the text sung with it.

7

Lavabo — ‘I shall wash’.

Gazebo — ‘I shall gaze’.

(The last one is a facetious coinage)

8

Porto - I carry (as in Porto-Potty “I carry poo”)
That’s all I’ve got.

9

fiat - let it be done

posse - to be able (actually from posse comitatus (“power of the county”)
audit - he hears (actually from auditus, “hearing”)

10

Isn’t “edit” eat? Or is that “edet”? I hate latin.

Lucky

11

There are two similar verbs

  1. edo, edere, edi, esum = eat
  2. edo, edere, edidi, editum = publish, bring forth.

The English word is related to #2.

12

caret (^) - it lacks
deficit - it is wanting
tenet - he holds
memento - remember (imperative)

See Latin and Greek in Current Use by Burriss and Casson

13

A little later in the same chapter:

affidavit - he has pledged
ignoramus - we do not know
stet - let it stand
floruit - he flourished

14

*Ignoramus — literally, ‘we don’t know’. Originated as a medieval legal document in which this word appeared, later transferred by jocular usage to an ignorant person.

Adit — literally, ‘it goes to’. The entrance to a mineshaft.

Obit — literally, ‘he or she goes away’.

Interestingly, the Latin verbal root i ‘go’ exactly coincides with the Japanese verbal root i ‘go’.

If Magnificat as the title of a text set to music, or the title of that musical setting itself, can count, then I offer you the Stabat Mater. This piece, set to music by many composers since the Middle Ages, takes its name from the beginning line Stabat mater dolorosa ‘The mother stood sorrowful’, a poem about the Blessed Virgin at Calvary.

15

Ah, but Stabat Mater is a phrase, as forbidden by the OP.

16

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I sang in Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater this spring – it’s an amazing piece of music. (Even if the girl who got the solo I really wanted wasn’t nearly as good as I would have been. :p)
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