Definify.com
Webster 1913 Edition
Saturnalia
1.
(Rom. Antiq.)
The festival of Saturn, celebrated in December, originally during one day, but afterward during seven days, as a period of unrestrained license and merriment for all classes, extending even to the slaves.
2.
Hence: A period or occasion of general license, in which the passions or vices have riotous indulgence.
Definition 2024
Saturnalia
Saturnalia
See also: saturnalia
Translingual
Etymology
From Latin Sāturnālia, interpreted as the Latin equivalent of Portuguese carnaval (“Carnival (the period before Lent)”); so called because the genus was discovered in Brazil during Carnival.
Proper noun
Saturnalia ?
- A taxonomic genus within the order Saurischia – a dinosaur from the Triassic period.
Hyponyms
- (genus): Saturnalia tupiniquim - the only species
English
Proper noun
Saturnalia
- An Ancient Roman holiday honoring the deity Saturn.
- 1913, Thomas Bulfinch, The Age of Fable, chapter I:
- Saturn was an ancient Italian deity. It was attempted to identify him with the Grecian god Cronos, and fabled that after his dethronement by Jupiter he fled to Italy, where he reigned during what was called the Golden Age. In memory of his beneficent dominion, the feast of Saturnalia was held every year in the winter season.
- 1913, Thomas Bulfinch, The Age of Fable, chapter I:
Translations
holiday to mark the winter solstice
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Anagrams
Latin
Etymology
From Sāturnus (“Saturn (the Roman god of agriculture)”).
Pronunciation
- (Classical) IPA(key): /saː.turˈnaː.li.a/, [saː.tʊrˈnaː.li.a]
Proper noun
Sāturnālia n pl (genitive Sāturnālium); third declension
- A festival of the winter solstice originally celebrated for three days beginning December 17th, but later extended to seven days.
Declension
Third declension neuter “pure” i-stem.
Case | Plural |
---|---|
nominative | Sāturnālia |
genitive | Sāturnālium |
dative | Sāturnālibus |
accusative | Sāturnālia |
ablative | Sāturnālibus |
vocative | Sāturnālia |
Derived terms
Descendants
- English: saturnalia, Saturnalia
References
- Saturnalia in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
- Saturnalia in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
- Félix Gaffiot (1934), “Saturnalia”, in Dictionnaire Illustré Latin-Français, Paris: Hachette.
saturnalia
saturnalia
See also: Saturnalia
English
Noun
saturnalia (plural saturnalias)
- A period or occasion of general license, in which the passions or vices have riotous indulgence; a period of unrestrained revelry.
- 1906, Upton Sinclair, The Jungle, Chapter 26
- They lodged men and women on the same floor; and with the night there began a saturnalia of debauchery—scenes such as never before had been witnessed in America.
- 1922, James Frazer, The Golden Bough, ch 14
- If at the birth of the Latin kings their fathers were really unknown, the fact points either to a general looseness of life in the royal family or to a special relaxation of moral rules on certain occasions, when men and women reverted for a season to the licence of an earlier age. Such Saturnalias are not uncommon at some stages of social evolution.
- 1922, Rafael Sabatini, Captain Blood: His Odyssy, ch XXVIII
- Yet if he remained, it would simply mean that his own and Hagthorpe's crews would join in the saturnalia and increase the hideousness of events now inevitable.
- 1961, Joseph Heller, Catch-22, ch 34
- It was a raw, violent, guzzling saturnalia that spilled obstreperously through the woods to the officers' club and spread up into the hills toward the hospital and the antiaircraft-gun emplacements.
- 2001, Chip Kidd, The Cheese Monkeys:
- We advanced into the main hall, already aroar with a saturnalia of sozzled gestures and gibbering.
- 1906, Upton Sinclair, The Jungle, Chapter 26
Translations
Related terms
- Saturn
- saturnalian
- saturnian