sacer

From Old Latin sacros, sakros, from Proto-Italic *sakros (“sacred”), from Proto-Indo-European *seh₂k- (“to sanctify, to make a treaty”).

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): [ˈsa.kɛr]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): [ˈsaː.t͡ʃer]

sacer (feminine sacra, neuter sacrum, superlative sacerrimus); first/second-declension adjective (nominative masculine singular in -er)

1. sacred, holy, dedicated (to a divinity), consecrated, hallowed (translating Greek ἱερός)
   • c. 200 BCE, Plautus, Menaechmi V.5.38:

     at ego te sacram coronam surrupuisse Iovi scio

     And I know that you stole the sacred crown of Jupiter.

2. devoted (to a divinity for sacrifice), fated (to destruction), forfeited, accursed
   • 29 BCE – 19 BCE, Virgil, Aeneid III.56:

     quid non mortalia pectora cogis / auri sacra fames

     Accursed hunger for gold, what do you not compel the hearts of men to do!

3. divine, celestial
   • 29 BCE – 19 BCE, Virgil, Aeneid VIII.591:

     extulit os sacrum caelo tenebrasque resoluit

     lifts to the skies his countenance divine, and melts the shadows of the night away.

   • early 7th c. CE, Isidore of Seville, Etymologiae sive Origines 9.1:

     Tres sunt autem linguae sacrae: Hebraea, Graeca, Latina, quae toto orbe maxime excellunt.

     Three are the sacred languages: Hebrew, Greek and Latin, all of which distinguish themselves in the whole world.

4. (only poetic and in post-Augustan prose) execrable, detestable, horrible, infamous; criminal, impious, wicked, abominable, cursed
   • c. 190 BCE, Plautus, Bacchides 4.6.14:

     ego sum malus ego sum sacer scelestus

     I am a bad one, I am a cursed one—a wicked one.

The comparative form *sacrior and its inflected variants are not attested, even though the superlative sacerrimus is attested.

First/second-declension adjective (nominative masculine singular in -er).

• (accursed): scelestus
• (consecrated, sacred): augustus, sānctus
• (detestable): exsecrābilis, scelestus

• (antonym(s) of “holy”): dēfānātus

From Proto-Italic *sākris (“sacrificial, sacred”), from Proto-Indo-European *seh₂k- (“to sanctify, to make a treaty”).

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): [ˈsaː.kɛr]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): [ˈsaː.t͡ʃer]

Generally cited with a long vowel by etymological sources. Per Nishimura (2014), citing Timpanaro (1965), the only evidence of the long vowel in the first syllable is the scansion in Plautus's Rudens (below). Syllables containing short vowels before a plosive-liquid cluster such as /kr/ are not usually treated as heavy in Plautine poetry.^[1]

sācer (feminine sācris, neuter sācre); third-declension three-termination adjective (uncommon)

1. sacred, holy, suitable to be sacrificed (found especially as an adjective applying to the noun porcus)
   • c. 200 BCE, Plautus, Menaechmi 290:

     responde mihi / adulescens: quibus hic pretiis porci veneunt / sacres sinceri?

     (please add an English translation of this quotation)

   • c. 211 BCE, Plautus, Rudens 1208:

     sunt domi agni et porci sacres.

     (please add an English translation of this quotation)

Third-declension three-termination adjective.

• “sacer”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “sacer”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• sacer in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• Carl Meißner, Henry William Auden (1894) Latin Phrase-Book‎^[1], London: Macmillan and Co.
  • (ambiguous) ritual; ceremonial: sacra, res divinae, religiones, caerimoniae
    
  • (ambiguous) to sacrifice: sacra, sacrificium facere (ἱερὰ ῥέζειν), sacrificare
    
  • (ambiguous) to profane sacred rites: sacra polluere et violare
    
• 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 532