farfarum

Latin edit

Alternative forms edit

farferum, farfugium, farfara, farfaria

Etymology edit

Unknown, presumed a borrowing from another Italian language.

Nikolaev proposes a derivation from Proto-Indo-European *bʰeh₂s-o-bʰor-o-, a compound of *bʰeh₂-es- (“shining”) and *bʰer- (“to bear”) also found in Ancient Greek φωσφόρος (phōsphóros, literally “light-bearing”). The name may be assumed to arise from the flowers' radiant shape. The -a- from the second syllable would then stem from assimilation to the first syllable.^[1]

Noun edit

farfarum n (genitive farfarī); second declension

coltsfoot

Usage notes edit

The only attested forms, bar the feminine by-forms, are accusative singular farfarum and farfugium in Pliny’s Natural History 24, 135 and genitive singular farferi in Plautus’s Poenulus 478. As these endings syncretize more than one possible lemma form, it has been posited variously by lexicographers, and borrowed by taxonomists, as either masculine farfarus or neuter farfarum or masculine farfar.

Declension edit

Second-declension noun (neuter).

Case	Singular	Plural
Nominative	farfarum	farfara
Genitive	farfarī	farfarōrum
Dative	farfarō	farfarīs
Accusative	farfarum	farfara
Ablative	farfarō	farfarīs
Vocative	farfarum	farfara

Descendants edit

Italian: farfara

References edit

^ Nikolaev, Alexander (2018) “Latin farferum ‘coltsfoot’: A trace of Indo-European poetic language in Latin plant nomenclature?”, in Indo-European linguistics and classical philology, volume XXII, Institute for Linguistic Studies at the Russian Academy of Sciences, →DOI, →ISSN, pages 961–966