I’ve long used “Acilius” as my screen-name, in tribute to Gaius Acilius, a Roman historian who was alive and doing interesting things in 155 BC. It never occurred to me that anyone would know the etymology of the name “Acilius”; it was quite an old name among the Romans, and they did not really keep track of that sort of thing in those days.
A couple of months ago, I happened onto a post on the blog “Paleoglot” which led me to wonder if there might not be a way to explore the question of where the gens Acilia found its name. Blogger Glen Gordon analyzes various occurrences of a stem acil- in Etruscan. In his conclusion, Mr Gordon offers these definitions to cover the occurrences he has discussed:
I think we could define the English translations of the whole word family much better as part of a grander morphological design:
*aχ (v.) = ‘to do, to make, to cause’
> acas (v.) = ‘to craft, to make’
> acil (n.) = ‘thing, act; rite, holy service’ (> acil (v.) = ‘to do rites, to worship’)The implied underlying verb here, *aχ, reminds me very much of the Indo-European *h₂eǵ-, as if borrowed from Latin agere ‘to drive, lead, conduct, impel’.
This intrigues me very much. If the Etruscans borrowed such a word from Latin, that would suggest that the usual story about the relationship between Etruscan religion and Roman religion is misleading. Rather than a situation in which the Etruscans molded the religious practices and ideas of their subjects, the early Romans, the presence of a Latinate word in Etruscan religious vocabulary would suggest a reciprocal relationship between the hegemonic Etruscans and their vassals.
On the other hand, if the similarity between acil- and agere is a mere coincidence, another possibility presents itself. This is where the Acilii come to mind. Perhaps the name “Acilius” is a combination of the Etruscan root acil-, with its sense of performing holy service, and the Latinate suffix -ius. A fairly exact equivalent could be suggested, as chance would have it, in the English name “Priestley,” where the borrowed word priest is combined with the indigenous suffix -ley. So perhaps all these years I’ve been unwittingly associating myself with such distinguished polymaths as Joseph Priestley and J. B. Priestley.
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The Battle of the Acilian Chuckle
Victor Mair is one of the most distinguished scholars of Chinese language and literature in the United States. Among his many services to the enlightenment of his countrymen are Professor Mair’s frequent contributions to Language Log.
I mention Professor Mair’s great eminence because he and I recently engaged in a remarkably absurd conflict. (more…)
Posted by acilius on August 31, 2012
https://losthunderlads.com/2012/08/31/the-battle-of-the-acilian-chuckle/