cuppes

Latin

Etymology

From cupiō (to desire). The gemination may be explained by the littera rule, one would then expect older*cūpēd-, from Proto-Italic *koup-ēd-. (This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium. Particularly: “-ēd-?”)

Pronunciation

Noun

cuppēs m (genitive cuppēdis); third declension

  1. (hapax legomenon) sweet tooth, glutton, one with a taste for delicacies
    • c. 195 BCE, Plautus, Trinummus 240:
      numquam Ámor quemquam nisi cúpidum hominem / postulát se in plagas conícere: / eos cúpit, eos consectátur; / súbdole blanditur ab re cónsulit, / blandíloquentulus, harpagó, mendax, / cuppés, avarus, élegans, despoliator / latebrícolarum hominum córruptor, / [blandus] inops célatum indagátor. / nam quí amat quod amat quom éxtemplo / saviís sagittatis pérculsust, / ílico rés foras lábitur, líquitur.
      Love never expects any but the willing man to throw himself in his toils; these he seeks for, these he follows up, and craftily counsels against their interests. He is a fawning flatterer, a rapacious grappler, a deceiver, a sweet-tooth, a spoiler, a corrupter of men who court retirement, a pryer into secrets. For he that is in love, soon as ever he has been smitten with the kisses of the object that he loves, forthwith his substance vanishes out of doors and melts away.The Comedies of Plautus. Henry Thomas Riley. London. G. Bell and Sons. 1912. Perseus

Usage notes

The masculine nominative singular form cuppēs occurs in Plautus' Trinummus as part of a list of negative nouns and adjectives describing love. Based on related words, the stem is inferred to be cuppēd-. The word could be a third-declension masculine noun or an adjective.

Declension

Third-declension noun.

singular plural
nominative cuppēs cuppēdēs
genitive cuppēdis cuppēdum
dative cuppēdī cuppēdibus
accusative cuppēdem cuppēdēs
ablative cuppēde cuppēdibus
vocative cuppēs cuppēdēs

Derived terms

References

  • cuppes”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  • cuppes in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
  • "cuppes", 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)