The corpus record — Latin

contumelia

contumelia · f

abuse, insult, affront, reproach, invective, contumely

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

Where it lives

De Constantia 31 · 58.66/10k
Ad Uxorem 3 · 7.22/10k
Ad Martyras 1 · 6.72/10k
Fabulae Aesopiae 7 · 6.38/10k
Pro Q. Ligario 2 · 6.1/10k
Epaminondas 1 · 5.99/10k
De Consolatione ad Helviam 4 · 5.91/10k
Themistocles 1 · 5.84/10k
Historiae 2 · 4.93/10k
De Paenitentia 2 · 4.91/10k
Ausonii Burdigalensis Vasatis Gratiarum Actio Ad Grati Angratianum Imperatorem Pro Consulatu 2 · 4.83/10k
In L. Calpurnium Pisonem 5 · 4.59/10k

Densest 12 of 127 attested works shown, by occurrences per 10,000 attested tokens.

What it meant

1. con-tŭmēlĭa — Lewis & Short

con-tŭmēlĭa (post-class. access. form contŭmĭa, ae, f.from a root tem, whence also temno, contemno, and contumax; cf. Dig. 47, 10, 1,

Mart. Cap. 4, § 424; cf.: contumia contumelia, Gloss. Isid.),

I abuse, insult, affront, reproach, invective, contumely (cf.: injuria, u(/bris; very freq. and class. in sing. and plur.): contumelia a contemptu dicta est, quia nemo nisi quem contempsit, tali injuriā notat, Sen. Const. 11, 2: patior facile injuriam, si est vacua a contumeliā, Pac. ap. Non. p. 430, 16; cf. Caecil. ib.: contumeliam alteri facere, Plaut. As. 2, 4, 82; Ter. Phorm. 5, 7 (8), 79; cf. id. Eun. 5, 2, 26: contumeliam dicere alicui, Plaut. Curc. 4, 1, 17; id. Bacch. 2, 3, 33; Ter. Phorm. 2, 3, 29; Liv. 25, 22, 13: contumeliam si dicis, audies, Plaut. Ps. 4, 7, 77: jacere in aliquem, Cic. Sull. 7, 23: meretricum perpeti, Ter. Eun. 1, 1, 3; cf. Cic. Verr. 2, 3, 41, § 96: in se accipere, Ter. Eun. 4, 7, 1; cf.: tanta contumelia accepta, Caes. B. G. 7, 10: alicui imponere, Sall. C. 48, 9: quibus tu privatim injurias plurimas contumeliasque imposuisti, Cic. Verr. 2, 4, 9, § 20: indignitates contumeliasque perferre, Caes. B. G. 2, 14: graves, severe reproaches (opp. libera consilia), Hor. Epod. 11, 26: aliquid in suam contumeliam vertere, Caes. B. C. 1, 8: per contumeliam, id. ib. 1, 9; Quint. 4, 1, 11: contumeliā perfugae appellari ab aliquo, Caes. B. C. 2, 28; cf. Liv. 3, 50, 6 et saep.: in contumeliam ignominiamque nostram certare juvat, id. 4, 4, 12: contumeliae verborum, Cic. Phil. 11, 2, 5.—In mal. part., violation, Liv. 8, 28, 2; Auct. Har. Resp. 20, 42.—The expression facere contumeliam is censured by Cic. (Phil. 3, 9, 22) in the words of Antonius: nulla contumelia est, quam facit dignus; but it is not clear on what grounds (whether as an archaism, or because it is used after the analogy of jacturam facere, in the sense of contumelia adfici); v. Quint. 9, 3, 13, and cf. esp. Gronov. Observv. 3, 8, pp. 488-502 (pp. 241-247 Frotsch.).—Personified: Contŭmē-lĭa, like *(/ubris, Cic. Leg. 2, 11, 28.—*

II Transf., injury, assault, annoyance, violence, blows, etc. ( = injuria): naves totae factae ex robore ad quamvis vim et contumeliam perferendam, injury, violence, Caes. B. G. 3, 13; so Phaedr. 1, 2, 21: praeberi ora contumeliis, to the blows, Tac. H. 3, 31; 3, 85: debilitatis suae, annoyance, hardship, Plin. Ep. 8, 18, 9; cf. injuria.

2. contumelia — Walde–Hofmann

contumelia, -ae f. „kränkende Behandlung, Beschimpfung, Schmach, schimpfliche Mißhandlung“ (seit Plaut., -ösus seit Ter.): nach Wharton 268 conübium — convexus. Et. lat. s. v., Pokrowskij KZ. 35, 2311. (vgl. Ieid. 10, 46) wie coniumüx als „übermütige Handlung oder Äußerung“ zu tumeö; zu- nde liegt *eontumelis ,übermütig sich benehmend* (Stolz HG 513; Ausgang wohl nach eradélis; kaum *contumelos, Pokrowskij a. O., … — [Walde–Hofmann, s.v. contumelia, p. 299]

In the wild

contumeliis Cicero, De haruspicum responso in P. Clodium in Senatu Habita 17
contumeliae Seneca, De Consolatione ad Helviam 11.13.6
contumelia Tertullian, Adversus Marcionem 4.35
contumelias Seneca, De Constantia 2.18.2
contumelia Quintilian, Institutio Oratoria 9.3.13
contumeliam Livy, Ab urbe condita 1.6.18.4

6 of 498 attestations shown.

Where it came from

Ernout-Meillet, Dictionnaire etymologique de la langue latine Treated in Ernout-Meillet, Dictionnaire etymologique de la langue latine s.v. contumélia (scan p. 164; entry #2495).
Walde-Hofmann, Lateinisches etymologisches Worterbuch Treated in Walde-Hofmann, Lateinisches etymologisches Worterbuch s.v. contumelia (scan pp. 299-300; entry #762).

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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.