The corpus record — Latin

barba

beard

Generated live from the audited Latin corpus — every figure on this page is a database query, not prose from memory.

Where it lives

Lydia, Appendix Vergiliana 1 · 18.76/10k
Verus 2 · 9.72/10k
Saturae 3 · 6.63/10k
Panegyricus dictus Probino et Olybrio consulibus 1 · 5.88/10k
Datames 1 · 5.49/10k
C. Caligula 4 · 5.24/10k
Antoninus Heliogabalus 3 · 5.18/10k
Saturae 10 · 4.02/10k
De vita Hadriani 2 · 3.9/10k
Helvius Pertinax 1 · 3.85/10k
Nero 3 · 3.84/10k
Eclogarum Liber 1 · 3.65/10k

Densest 12 of 85 attested works shown, by occurrences per 10,000 attested tokens.

What it meant

1. barba — de Vaan

barba 'beard' [f. a] (P1.+) Derivatives: barbatus 'bearded' (Elog.Scip., P1.+), barbula 'little beard' (Lucil.+), — [de Vaan, s.v. barba, p. 83]

2. barba — Lewis & Short

barba, ae, f.cf. O. H. Germ. part; Germ. Bart; Engl. beard.

I Lit., the beard, of men: alba, Plaut. Bacch. 5, 1, 15: hirquina, id. Ps. 4, 2, 12: mollis, Lucr. 5, 673: promissa, long, Nep. Dat. 3, 1; Liv. 5, 41, 9; Tac. A. 2, 31; id. G. 31: immissa, Verg. A. 3, 593; Ov. M. 12, 351; Quint. 12, 3, 12: stiriaque inpexis induruit horrida barbis, Verg. G. 3, 366: submittere (as a sign of mourning). Suet. Caes. 67; id. Aug. 23; id. Calig. 24: prima, Juv. 8, 166: barbam tondere, Cic. Tusc. 5, 20, 58: maxima barba, Cic. Verr. 2, 2, 25, § 62: major, id. Agr. 2, 5, 13: ponere, Hor. A. P. 298; Suet. Calig. 5; 10; id. Ner. 12: jam libet hirsutam tibi falce recidere barbam, Ov. M. 13, 766: abradere, to clip off. Plin. 6, 28, 32, § 162; cf. Baumg.Crus. Suet. Caes. 45: rasitare, Gell. 3, 4: barbam vellere alicui, to pluck one by the beard (an insult), Hor. S. 1, 3, 133: sapientem pascere barbam, i. e. to study the Stoic philosophy, id. ib. 2, 3, 35; Pers. 1, 133; 2, 28: capillatior quam ante barbāque majore, Cic. Agr. 2, 5, 13; Cic. Verr. 2, 2, 25, § 62: in gens et cana barba, Plin. Ep. 1, 10, 6.—Sometimes in plur. of a heavy, long beard, Petr. 99, 5; App. M. 4, p. 157, 1.—The statues of the gods had barbas aureas, Cic. N. D. 3, 34, 83; hence, barbam auream habere = deum esse, Petr. 58, 6; cf. Pers. 2, 56.—The ancient Romans allowed the beard to grow long (hence, barbati, Cic. Mur. 12; id. Cael. 14, 33; id. Fin. 4, 23, 62; Juv. 4, 103; and: dignus barbā capillisque Majorum, of an upright, honest man, Juv. 16, 31), until A.U.C. 454, when a certain P. Titinius Menas brought barbers to Rome from Sicily, and introduced the custom of shaving the beard, Varr R. R. 2, 11, 10; Plin. 7, 59, 59, § 211. Scipio Africanus was the first who caused himself to be shaved daily, Plin. 1. 1. Still, this custom seems to have become general first in the Aug. per.; cf. Boettig. Sabina, 2, p. 57 sq.; Goer. Cic. Fin. 4, 23, 62.—Young men allowed the beard to grow for some years; hence. juvenes barbatuli or bene barbati (v. barbatulus and barbatus). It was the custom to devote the first beard cut off to some deity, esp. to Apollo, Jupiter, or Venus, Petr. 29; Juv. 3, 186; Suet. Ner. 12.—

II Transf.

A Of animals: hircorum, Plin. 12, 17, 37, § 74: caprarum, id. 26, 8, 30, § 47: gallinaceorum, id. 30, 11, 29, § 97: luporum, Hor. S. 1, 8, 42. —

B Of plants, the wool: nucum, Plin. 15, 22, 24, § 89; cf. id. 17, 23, 35, § 202.—

C Barba Jovis, a shrub, the silver-leaved woolblade: Anthyllis barba Jovis, Linn.; Plin. 16, 18, 31, § 76.

3. Barba — Lewis & Short

Barba, ae, m.,

I a Roman name, e. g. Cassius Barba, a friend of Cœsar and Antony, Cic. Phil. 13, 1, 2 sq.; id. Att. 13, 52, 1.

4. barba — Walde–Hofmann

barba, -ae f. „Bart“ (seit Plaut, rom. [auch „Kinn“, MeyerLübke WuS. 12, 6], ebenso -àfws „bärtig* seit Plt., -u/a „Bärtchen“ seit Lucil, -itium n. „Haarwuchs“ seit Apul.; vlt. und rom. barba *barbanis „Onkel“, s. Meyer-Lübke Einf.* 188, Rh. M. 66, 635 £.): ahd. bart, ags. beard m. „Bart“, aksl. usw. brada, apr. bordus (Aus- ang unklar), lett. bärda ds. (daneben bärzda, lit. barzdd durch infuf von balt. *bdarzda = … — [Walde–Hofmann, s.v. barba, p. 128]

In the wild

barba Plautus, Pseudolus 4.2
barba Martial, Epigrammata 4.36.1
barba Catullus, Carmina lyrics.37.19
barba Juvenal, Saturae 5.16.31
barbam Tertullian, Apologeticum 22.12
barba Sidonius Apollinaris, Epistulae, Books VIII-IX 9.IX.p14

6 of 218 attestations shown.

Where it came from

de Vaan, Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages (Brill 2008) Treated in de Vaan, Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages (Brill 2008) s.v. barba (scan p. 83; entry #139).
Ernout-Meillet, Dictionnaire etymologique de la langue latine Treated in Ernout-Meillet, Dictionnaire etymologique de la langue latine s.v. barba (scan p. 90; entry #1169).
Walde-Hofmann, Lateinisches etymologisches Worterbuch Treated in Walde-Hofmann, Lateinisches etymologisches Worterbuch s.v. barba (scan p. 128; entry #365). Root candidates: *bhares-.

Latin text and lemmatization derived from the Perseus Digital Library (canonical-latinLit), CC BY-SA 4.0. Lewis & Short (public domain) via Perseus. This derived data is shared under the same CC BY-SA 4.0 license.