colonus

See also: Colonus

English

Etymology

From Latin colōnus.

Noun

colonus (plural coloni)

  1. (historical) A sharecropping tenant farmer of the late Roman Empire and Early Middle Ages.

Anagrams

Latin

Etymology

Uncertain. Perhaps from the ending of agricola and modelled on patrōnus. Alternatively, from the affixation of *-no- to *kʷolh₁-oh₁, the instrumental singular of a noun *kʷólh₁-o-. De Vaan posits, albeit uncertainly, a pre-form Proto-Italic *kʷelōnos. Ultimately from the root Proto-Indo-European *kʷel-.

Pronunciation

Noun

colōnus m (genitive colōnī, feminine colōna); second declension

  1. farmer, especially a kind of tenant farmer or sharecropper; husbandman; tiller of the soil
    • 8 CE, Ovid, Fasti 1.677–678:
      frūgibus immēnsīs avidōs satiāte colōnōs,
      ut capiant cultūs praemia digna suī.
      Satisfy eager farmers with abundant crops,
      that they may reap rewards worthy of their labors.
  2. colonist, colonial, inhabitant
    Colonos novos ascribere.
    To appoint new inhabitants.

Declension

Second-declension noun.

singular plural
nominative colōnus colōnī
genitive colōnī colōnōrum
dative colōnō colōnīs
accusative colōnum colōnōs
ablative colōnō colōnīs
vocative colōne colōnī

Synonyms

Derived terms

Descendants

  • Catalan: colon
  • French: colon
  • Italian: colono
  • Portuguese: colono
  • Sicilian: culunu
  • Spanish: colono
  • ? Japanese: 植民 (calque) (see there for further descendants)

References

  • colonus”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  • colonus”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
  • "colonus", in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition with additions by D. P. Carpenterius, Adelungius and others, edited by Léopold Favre, 1883–1887)
  • colonus in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
  • colonus”, in The Perseus Project (1999) Perseus Encyclopedia[1]
  • colonus”, in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898), Harper’s Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers
  • De Vaan, Michiel (2008) Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages (Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series; 7), Leiden, Boston: Brill, →ISBN, page 125