domus

English

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin domus. Doublet of dome and duomo.

Noun

domus (plural domus)

1. (anthropology, archaeology) A farmstead with its people, plants and animals, considered as a unit.
   • 2017, James C Scott, chapter 2, in Against the Grain, New Haven and London: Yale University, →ISBN, page 73:

     The domus was a unique and unprecedented concentration of tilled fields, seed and graain stores, people, and domestic animals, all coevolving with consequences no one could possibly have foreseen.

2. (dated) In the UK a college (or collectively its fellows) in Cambridge or Oxford.

See also

• domus de janas

Anagrams

• Odums, doums, odums, modus

Latin

Alternative forms

• demus (uncertain)

Etymology

For Proto-Italic *domos, from Proto-Indo-European *dṓm (“house, home”), from root *dem- (“to build”). Cognates include Ancient Greek δόμος (dómos), Albanian dhomë (“a chamber, a room”), Avestan 𐬛𐬀𐬨- (dam-) Sanskrit दम (dáma), Proto-Slavic *domъ and further to English timber. At least indirectly cognate to Latin dominus.

The feminine gender is probably due to the original root noun; attempts to transfer it to the 4th declension are due to 2nd declension feminines being unusual outside of tree names. Some manuscripts of Plautus show forms in dem-; De Vaan (2008) doubts their authenticity.

Pronunciation

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /ˈdo.mus/, [ˈd̪ɔmʊs̠]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈdo.mus/, [ˈd̪ɔːmus]

Noun

domus f (irregular, variously declined, genitive domūs or domī); fourth declension, second declension

1. house, home (the building where a person lives)

   Hypernyms: aedificium, aedēs

   Hyponyms: casa, domuncula, tugurium, gurgustium

   Deō domuīque ― For God and for home (motto of Methodist Ladies' College, Melbourne)

   Stet fortūna domūs ― Let the good fortune of the house stand (motto of Harrow School, England)

   • 8 CE, Ovid, Fasti 2.792:

     nox erat et tōta lūmina nūlla domō

     It was night, and [there were] no lights in the whole house.

   1. a townhouse
2. any dwelling-place or abode (of people or animals)

   Synonyms: domicilium, habitāculum, habitātiō, tēctum, mānsiō, sēdēs, aedēs

3. the place of one's birth or residence, native country, town

   Hypernym: patria

   1. (also of the shell of invertebrates, tombs of the dead)
4. household, family (the dependants of the head of a house)
   1. a group of disciples, school; an intellectual movement
   2. (monarchy) house, dynasty
5. (idiomatic) one's own possessions or resources

   domum trahere ― to drag into one's pocket

   Domī versūra fit. ― One is one's own creditor. (proverb)

   domō afferre ― to conceive on one's own

   • c. 190 BCE – 185 BCE, Plautus, Amphitryon 637:

     id nunc experior domō

     Now I'm learning this first-hand.

6. (in locative case in phrases, idiomatic) peace

   bellī domīque; bellō domīque; vel bellī vel domī; domī bellōque; domī mīlitiaeque ― in war and peace

   • 27 BCE – 25 BCE, Titus Livius, Ab Urbe Condita 1.38:

     ut non quietior populus domi esset quam militiae

     so that the people should not become lazier in the time of peace than that of war

Usage notes

• This is one of a handful of common nouns that take the locative case; others are bellum, rūs and humus.
• It is irregular in that it has a mix of second and fourth declension forms, the second declension forms being more idiomatic. The classically most common declension is as follows:

domus, domūs, domuī, domum, domō — domūs, domōrum, domibus, domōs, domibus.

Declension

Fourth/second-declension noun, with locative.

	singular	plural
nominative	domus	domūs
genitive	domūs domī	domuum domōrum
dative	domuī domō domū	domibus
accusative	domum	domūs domōs
ablative	domū domō	domibus
vocative	domus	domūs
locative	domī	domibus

Locative used in the sense "at home".

Derived terms

• domī (“at home, in the house”, adverbial form)
• domī habeō (“I have at home, I have in abundance, I am provided with”, colloquial)
• domum (“home, homewards, to the house”, adverbial form)
• domō (“from home, out of the house; at home, in the house”, adverbial form)
• extrā domum (“placed outside of the house; refers to a possible result of Catholic ecclesiastical legal proceedings when the culprit is removed from being part of a group like a monastery”)
• prō domō (“for one’s own home or house; serving the interests of a given perspective or for the benefit of a given group”)
• domuncula
• domesticus
• Domidūcus
• domiporta
• domiseda
• dominus
• domītus
• domuitiō
• domus equestris

Related terms

• domō
• domefactus

Descendants

• Italian: duomo, domo (“cathedral”)
  • → Middle French: dome
    • French: dôme (“cathedral”)
      • →? Piedmontese: dòm, dom
      • →? Portuguese: domo
• Old French: dom (rare)
• Venetan: domo
• Sardinian: domu, domo, dommu
• Sicilian: domu
• → Proto-West Germanic: *dōm (see there for further descendants; some were later influenced by French)

See also

• aedēs
• aedificium
• aedis
• casa
• domicilium
• habitātiō
• mānsiō
• mōlēs
• sēdēs
• tēctum
• tugurium

 

References

• De Vaan, Michiel (2008) “domus, dominus”, in Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages (Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series; 7), Leiden, Boston: Brill, →ISBN, pages 177-179
• Walther von Wartburg (1928–2002) “domus”, in Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch, volumes 3: D–F, page 135
• Dizionario Latino, Olivetti

Further reading

• “domus”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “domus”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• domus in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition with additions by D. P. Carpenterius, Adelungius and others, edited by Léopold Favre, 1883–1887)
• domus in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette, page 555.
• domus in Georges, Karl Ernst, Georges, Heinrich (1913–1918) Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th edition, volume 1, Hahnsche Buchhandlung, column 2285
• Carl Meißner, Henry William Auden (1894) Latin Phrase-Book‎^[1], London: Macmillan and Co.
  • a comfortably-furnished house: domus necessariis rebus instructa
    
  • the house threatens to fall in (vid. sect. X. 5, note 'Threaten'...): domus ruina impendet
    
  • the house threatens to fall in (vid. sect. X. 5, note 'Threaten'...): domus collapsura, corruitura (esse) videtur
    
  • the house suddenly fell in ruins: domus subita ruina collapsa est
    
  • to demolish, raze a house: domum demoliri (Top. 4. 22)
    
  • the house is not large enough for all: domus non omnes capit (χωρειν)
    
  • to be a regular visitor at a house: domum frequentare (Sall. Cat. 14. 7)
    
  • the house walls are beginning to crack: domus rimas agit
    
  • (ambiguous) to welcome to one's house (opp. to shut one's door against some one): tecto, (in) domum suam aliquem recipere (opp. prohibere aliquem tecto, domo)
    
  • to welcome a man as a guest in one's house: hospitio aliquem accipere or excipere (domum ad se)
    
  • I am always welcome at his house: domus patet, aperta est mihi
    
  • (ambiguous) to invite some one to one's house: invitare aliquem tecto ac domo or domum suam (Liv. 3. 14. 5)
    
  • to give, undertake a contract for building a house: domum aedificandam locare, conducere
    
  • (ambiguous) to rush out of the house: se proripere ex domo
    
  • (ambiguous) I felt quite at home in his house: apud eum sic fui tamquam domi meae (Fam. 13. 69)
    
  • (ambiguous) to welcome to one's house (opp. to shut one's door against some one): tecto, (in) domum suam aliquem recipere (opp. prohibere aliquem tecto, domo)
    
  • (ambiguous) to never set foot out of doors: domo pedem non efferre
    
  • (ambiguous) to never appear in public: domi se tenere
    
  • (ambiguous) to escort a person from his house: deducere aliquem de domo
    
  • (ambiguous) at home; in one's native country: domi (opp. foris)
    
  • (ambiguous) to turn a person out of his house, his property: expellere aliquem domo, possessionibus pellere
    
  • (ambiguous) to live in some one's house: habitare in domo alicuius, apud aliquem (Acad. 2. 36. 115)
    
  • (ambiguous) to emigrate: domo emigrare (B. G. 1. 31)
    
  • (ambiguous) homeless: domo profugus (Liv. 1. 1)
    
  • (ambiguous) to invite some one to one's house: invitare aliquem tecto ac domo or domum suam (Liv. 3. 14. 5)
    
• “domus”, in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898), Harper's Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers
• “domus”, in William Smith et al., editor (1890), A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, London: William Wayte. G. E. Marindin

Anagrams

• modus

Volapük

Noun

domus

1. predicative plural of dom