argentifex

From argentum (“silver”) +‎ -fex (“suffix representing a maker or producer”).

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): [arˈɡɛn.tɪ.fɛks]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): [arˈd͡ʒɛn̪.t̪i.feks]

argentifex m (genitive argentificis); third declension

1. (New Latin) a worker in silver, silversmith
   • 1761, Paolo Paciaudi, Monumenta Peloponnesia: Commentariis Explicata‎^[1], Typographia Palladis, page 69:

     Quibus intellectis, planiſſimum ſit, tota ectyporum ſerie ΚΛΕΡΟΜΑΝΤΕΙΑΝ, divinitationem per ſortes, aptiſſime portendi, ut ad loci naturam, proprietatemque argentifex respexiſſe videatur

     (please add an English translation of this quotation)

   • 1747, Johann Georg Model, De Borace Nativa‎^[2], page 33:

     Quin ſolutio argenti ab aqua forti, noſtra Borace imbuta, mox praecipitatur. Idem ſcilicet contingebat, quod in aqua forti accidi vitrioli auto ſalis labe inquinata, trito argentificibus experimento cotidie contingit.

     (please add an English translation of this quotation)

   • 1905, Franz Xaver Funk, Didascalia et Constitutiones Apostolorum‎^[3], Paderbornae, page 224:

     vel ab eis, qui coloribus pingunt vel idola faciunt, vel ab aurificibus et argentificibus et aerificibus furibus vel a publicanis iniustis vel ab eis, qui simulant se visa videre, vel ab eis, qui pondera mutant vel dolose metiuntur, vel a cauponibus aquam admiscentibus, 4.

     (please add an English translation of this quotation)

• Varro mentions the term during the Classical period, although he states that a word for "silversmith" formed like "aurifex (“goldsmith”)" does not exist.

• 116 BCE – 27 BCE, Marcus Terentius Varro, De Lingua Latina 8.62.4:

  […] neque ut aurificem, sic argentificem.

  […] that there is no [term] argentifex ‘silversmith’ like aurifex ‘goldsmith’.

Third-declension noun.

• argentĭfex in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.