Article published in:
Embodiment in Latin Semantics
Edited by William Michael Short
[Studies in Language Companion Series 174] 2016
► pp. 141–176

The metaphorical structuring of kinship in Latin

| EHESS, Paris – University of Siena
In this paper, I analyze how concepts related to the domains of space and plants were used by Latin speakers to deliver their culturally specific understanding of (some aspects of) human kinship, in the light of the theory of conceptual metaphor. I go on to claim that analysis of the metaphorical layer of Latin lexicon of kinship can contribute to its “emic” description in ancient Rome, that is, framing it (as much as possible) in concepts near to the Romans’ own experience. First, I describe the contribution that the domains of space and plants makes to the metaphorical structuring of Roman ideas about kinship. Then, I move on to their interplay and to their interaction with Roman images of time, which appear to be ultimately responsible for some of the seemingly odd features of these metaphors. I conclude by trying to spell out some differences between modern and ancient elaborations of the tree as a cultural image.
Keywords: anthropology of ancient Rome, conceptual metaphor theory, cultural metaphors, kinship in ancient Rome, kinship terms, Latin, tree diagrams
Published online: 11 May 2016
https://doi.org/10.1075/slcs.174.06buc
References
Bader, Françoise
1962 La formation des composés nominaux du latin. Paris: Belles Lettres. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Beltrami, Lucia
1998 Il sangue degli antenati: Stirpe, adulterio e figli senza padre nella cultura romana. Bari: Edipuglia.Google Scholar
Benveniste, Émile
1936 Liber et Liberi. Revue Des Études Latines 14: 51–8.Google Scholar
1965 Termes de parenté dans les langues indo-européennes. L’Homme 5(3–4): 5–16.Google Scholar
1969 Le Vocabulaire Des Institutions Indeo-européennes. Paris: Les Éditions de Minuit.Google Scholar
Bettini, Maurizio
1991 Anthropology and Roman Culture: Kinship, Time, Images of the Soul. Baltimore MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.Google Scholar
1999 The Portrait of the Lover. Berkeley CA: University of California Press.Google Scholar
2009 Affari di famiglia: La parentela nella letteratura e nella cultura antica. Bologna: Il Mulino.Google Scholar
Bettini, Maurizio & Short, William
2014 Introduzione. In Con i Romani. Antropologia della cultura antica, Maurizio Bettini & William Short (eds), 7–22. Bologna: Il Mulino.Google Scholar
Boroditsky, Lera
2000 Metaphoric structuring: Understanding time through spatial metaphors. Cognition 75(1): 1–28. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
2001 Does language shape thought? Mandarin and English speakers’ conceptions of time. Cognitive Psychology 43(1): 1–22. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Boroditsky, Lera & Ramscar, Michael
2002 The roles of body and mind in abstract thought. Psychological Science 13(2): 185–89. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Bretin-Chabrol, Marine
2012 L’arbre et la lignée: Métaphores végétales de la filiation et de l’alliance en latin classique. Grenoble: Jérôme Millon.Google Scholar
Brugman, Claudia & Lakoff, George
1988 Cognitive Topology and Lexical Networks. In Lexical Ambiguity Resolution, Steven Small, Garrison Cottrell & Michael Tanenhaus (eds), 477–507. Palo Alto CA: Morgan Kaufmann. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Bruns, Carl Georg
1887 Fontes iuris romani antiqui. Freiburg: Mohr.Google Scholar
Buccheri, Alessandro
2012 Costruire l’umano in termini vegetali. Φύω e φύσις nella tragedia greca. I Quaderni del Ramo d’Oro Online 5: 137–65.Google Scholar
Casasanto, Daniel
2010 Space for thinking. In Language, Cognition and Space: The State of the Art and New Directions, Vyvyan Evans & Paul Chilton (eds), 453–78. London: Equinox.Google Scholar
Casasanto, Daniel & Boroditsky, Lera
2008 Time in the mind: Using space to think about time. Cognition 106(2): 579–93. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Chilton, Paul A
2010 Introduction. In Language, Cognition and Space: The State of the Art and New Directions, Vyvyan Evans & Paul Chilton (eds), 1–18. London: Equinox.Google Scholar
Delbrück, Berthold
1889 Die indogermanischen Verwandtschaftsnamen. Ein Beitrag zur vergleichenden Alterthumskunde. Lipsia: Hirzel.Google Scholar
Deleuze, Gilles & Guattari, Félix
1987 A Thousand Plateaus. Minneapolis MN: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Evans, Vyvyan
2013 Language and Time. Cambridge: CUP. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Evans, Vyvyan & Chilton, Paul
(eds) 2010 Language, Cognition and Space: The State of the Art and New Directions. London: Equinox.Google Scholar
Fayer, Carla
1994 La familia romana. Rome: L’Erma di Bretschneider.Google Scholar
Flower, Harriet
1996 Ancestor Masks and Aristocratic Power in Roman Culture. Oxford: Clarendon.Google Scholar
Geertz, Clifford
1983 Local knowledge. Further Essays in Interpretive Anthropology. New York NY: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Guastella, Gianni
1985 La rete del sangue: simbologia delle relazioni e modelli dell’identità nella cultura romana. Materiali e Discussioni per l’Analisi dei Testi Classici 15: 49–123. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Johnson, Christopher, Jussen, Bernhard, Warren Sabean, David & Teuscher, Simon
(eds) 2013 Blood and Kinship: Matter for Metaphor from Ancient Rome to the Present. New York NY: Berghahn Books.Google Scholar
Johnson, Mark
1987 The Body in the Mind: The Bodily Basis of Meaning, Imagination, and Reason. Chicago IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Klapisch-Zuber, Christiane
2000 L’ombre des ancêtres: Essai sur l’imaginaire médiéval de la parenté. Paris: Fayard.Google Scholar
Kövecses, Zoltán
2005 Metaphor in Culture: Universality and Variation. Cambridge: CUP. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
2006 Language, Mind, and Culture: A Practical Introduction. Oxford: OUP.Google Scholar
2010 Metaphor: A Practical Introduction. Oxford: OUP.Google Scholar
Lakoff, George
1987 Women, Fire, and Dangerous Things: What Categories Reveal About the Mind. Chicago IL: University of Chicago Press. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Lakoff, George & Johnson, Mark
1980 Metaphors We Live By. Chicago IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
1999 Philosophy in the Flesh: The Embodied Mind and Its Challenge to Western Thought. New York NY: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Landau, Barbara, Dessalegn, Banchiamlack & Goldberg, Ariel
2010 Language and space: Momentary interactions. In Language, Cognition and Space: The State of the Art and New Directions, Vyvyan Evans & Paul Chilton (eds), 51–78. London: Equinox.Google Scholar
Lentano, Mario
2007 La prova del sangue: Storie di identità e storie di legittimità nella cultura latina. Bologna: Il Mulino.Google Scholar
Lloyd, Geoffrey
2007 Cognitive Variations. Oxford: OUP. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Lowe, Dunstan
2010 The symbolic value of grafting in ancient Rome. Transactions of the American Philological Association 140: 461–88.Google Scholar
Moore, Kevin
2006 Space-to-time mappings and temporal concepts. Cognitive Linguistics 17(2): 199–244. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Murphy, Gregory
1996 On metaphoric representation. Cognition 60: 173–204. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Núñez, Rafael, Motz, Benjamin & Teuscher, Ursina
2006 Time after time: The psychological reality of the ego-and time-reference-point distinction in metaphorical construals of time. Metaphor and Symbol 21(3): 133–46. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Núñez, Rafael & Sweetser, Eve
2006 With the future behind them: Convergent evidence from Aymara language and gesture in the crosslinguistic comparison of spatial construals of time. Cognitive Science 30(3): 401–50. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Rosenberg, David & Grafton, Anthony
2010 Cartographies of Time. A History of the Timeline. New York NY: Princeton Architectural Press.Google Scholar
Schadt, Hermann
1982 Die Darstellungen der Arbores consanguinitatis und der Arbores affinitatis: Bildschemata in juristischen Handschriften. Tübingen: Wasmuth.Google Scholar
Short, William
2014 Metafora. In Con i Romani: Un’antropologia della cultura antica, Maurizio Bettini & William Short (eds), 329–52. Bologna: Il Mulino.Google Scholar
2013 Latin Dē: A view from cognitive semantics. Classical Antiquity 32(2): 378–405. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Thomas, Yan
1988 Le droit romain. Le traité des computs du jureconsulte Paul. In Le dossier occidentale de la parenté. Textes juridiques indésirables sur la généalogie, Pierre Legendre (ed.), 27–119. Paris: Fayard.Google Scholar
Traugott, Elizabeth
1975 Spatial expressions of tense and temporal sequencing: A contribution to the study of semantic fields. Semiotica 15(3): 207–230. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Tyler, Andrea & Evans, Vyvyan
2003 The Semantics of English Prepositions: Spatial Scenes, Embodied Meaning, and Cognition. Cambridge: CUP. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Violi, Patrizia
1997 Significato ed esperienza. Milan: Bompiani.Google Scholar
Voci, Pasquale
1982 Linee storiche del diritto ereditario romano I. ANRW 2(14): 391–448.Google Scholar
Watson, Alan
1971 The Law of Succession in the Later Roman Republic. Oxford: Clarendon.Google Scholar
Cited by

Cited by 1 other publications

Buccheri, Alessandro, Irene De Felice, Chiara Fedriani & William M. Short
2021. Semantic analysis and frequency effects of conceptual metaphors of emotions in Latin. From a corpus-based approach to a dictionary of Latin metaphors. Journal of Latin Linguistics 20:2 ► pp. 163 ff. Crossref logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 25 may 2022. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.