The corpus record — Latin

scurra

fashionable city idler

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

Where it lives

Gallieni Duo 3 · 8.17/10k
Verus 1 · 4.86/10k
Firmus Saturninus, Proculus et Bonosus 1 · 4.32/10k
Satyrarum libri 6 · 4.23/10k
Helvius Pertinax 1 · 3.85/10k
Pro P. Quinctio 3 · 3.47/10k
De Pallio 1 · 2.92/10k
Commodus Antoninus 1 · 2.89/10k
Fabulae Aesopiae 3 · 2.74/10k
Severus 1 · 2.37/10k
Epistulae 2 · 2.02/10k
De Constantia 1 · 1.89/10k

Densest 12 of 41 attested works shown, by occurrences per 10,000 attested tokens.

What it meant

1. scurra — de Vaan

scurra 'fashionable city idler' [m. a] (Pl>) Whereas WH regard scurra as a borrowing from Etruscan, IEW and Meiser 1998 propose an etymology *skPv)fsa to a root *skers- 'to jump\ Yet this is a mere root etymology, without obvious cognates, and semantically uncompelling. Furthermore, m. nouns in -a, if inherited, tend to be etymologically transparent (cf. Leumann 1977: 280). BibL: WH Π: 502, EM 606, IEW 933-935, … — [de Vaan, s.v. scurra, p. 562]

2. scurra — Lewis & Short

scurra, ae, m.

I Orig., an elegant, town-bred man; a fine gentleman, gallant, dandy: tu urbanus vero scurra, deliciae popli, Rus mihi tu objectas? Plaut. Most. 1, 1, 14; cf. (opp. militaris) id. Ep. 1, 1, 13; id. Curc. 2, 3, 17.—Also of an elegant debauchee, Cic. Sest. 17, 39; Auct. Har. Resp. 20, 42.—

II Transf.

1 A city buffoon, droll, jester (usually in the suite of wealthy persons, and accordingly a kind of parasite; syn.: sannio, parasitus): urbani assidui cives, quos scurras vocant, Plaut. Trin. 1, 2, 165; id. Poen. 3, 2, 35; 5, 5, 2; id. Truc. 2, 6, 10; Cic. Quint. 3, 11; id. de Or. 2, 60, 247; Cic. Verr. 2, 3, 62, § 146; Auct. Her. 4, 10, 14: Hor. S. 1, 5, 52; 1, 8, 11; id. Ep. 1, 15, 28; 1, 18, 4; Vulg. 2 Reg. 6, 20.—Zeno sarcastically called Socrates scurra Atticus, Cic. N. D. 1, 34, 93: Sabinus Asilius, venustissimus inter rhetores scurra, Sen. Suas. 2, 12.—Of the clown in a pantomime, Juv. 13, 111.—Prov.: vetus est: De scurrā multo facilius divitem quam patremfamilias fieri posse, Cic. Quint. 17, 55. —

2 In the times of the later emperors, one of the guard, a soldier of the guard, a guardsman, Lampr. Alex. Sev. 61; 62 fin.; id. Heliog. 33; Treb. Poll. Trig. Tyr. 30.

3. scurra — Walde–Hofmann

scurra, -ae m. „Spaßmacher, Witzbold; Stutzer^ (seit Plaut, scurrula, -ae m. seit Apul., scwrror, -àri seit Hor., scurilis seit Cic. [vgl. serv-, vernilis, Leumann -Zis 11], scurrzlitäs seit Cic): wie sculna entl. aus dem Etr., vgl. etr. Seur(r)a (Herbig Gl. 15, 225). Nicht nach W. Meyer KZ. 28, 170 £., Persson Wzerw. 32. 87 aus *scursü, sq*Tsä, wozu weiter gr. oKaipw „springe, hüpfe, tanze“ (iErw. auch in an. … — [Walde–Hofmann, s.v. scurra, p. 1408]

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. scurra (scan p. 562; entry #1577). Root candidates: *skers-.
Ernout-Meillet, Dictionnaire etymologique de la langue latine Treated in Ernout-Meillet, Dictionnaire etymologique de la langue latine s.v. scurra (scan p. 630; entry #10402).
Walde-Hofmann, Lateinisches etymologisches Worterbuch Treated in Walde-Hofmann, Lateinisches etymologisches Worterbuch s.v. scurra (scan pp. 1408-1409; entry #2518). Root candidates: *scurri-.

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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.