Talk:campus

Latin campus ← Proto-Indo-European *kh₂em- (“bend”, “curve”)

Why does it come from a root meaning "crooked"? Wyang (talk) 07:20, 23 February 2015 (UTC)

@Wyang: Good question; the semantic development is unclear. It supposedly derives from the Proto-Indo-European *kh₂emp-, in turn from *kh₂em- (“bend”, “curve”); the Ancient Greek καμπή, κάμπη, κάμπτω, καμψός (kampḗ, kámpē, kámptō, kampsós) also derive thence, but none of them have a plausibly “field”-related sense. The Latin apparently comes to us via the Proto-Italic *kampos; maybe the sense development occurred during that intermediary phase. Whatever the case, I've requested the two PIE and PI terms that we don't have yet. — I.S.M.E.T.A. 11:57, 2 May 2017 (UTC)

@Wyang @I'm so meta even this acronym It's worth noting that the Campus Martius (seemingly one of the earliest attested "campi") is at a bend in the river Tiber. The Campi Flegrei are absolutely not flat, but round the bends of the Bay of Naples (or are perhaps named for the very round calderas in the area).

I would posit with some confidence that the semantic ultimately were transferred from the Campus Martius, which happens to be flat. The original sense might have been "The bend of Mars". For a similar semantic transfer, baiae in Late Latin came to have the sense of "baths", after the great bathhouses at Baiae, as is extremely evident in the Anthologia Latina and elsewhere. 73.15.84.132 18:50, 20 December 2023 (UTC)