scaena

Latin

Alternative forms

• scēna

Etymology

From Ancient Greek σκηνή (skēnḗ). Seemingly with a hypercorrective /ae̯/ > /eː/ in reaction to an opposite trend (cf. haedus, saeta > ēdus, sēta).

Pronunciation

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): [ˈskae̯.na]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): [ˈʃɛː.na]

Noun

scaena f (genitive scaenae); first declension

1. stage
   • 29 BCE – 19 BCE, Virgil, Aeneid 4.471–472:

     [...] aut Agamemnonius scēnīs agitātus Orestēs
     armātam facibus mātrem et serpentibus ātrīs [...].

     [...] or [like] Agamemnon’s [son] Orestes, tormented onstage [by his dead] mother [who is] armed with torches and black snakes, [...].
     (A poetic plural reference to theatrical performances of the tragedy.)

   • 116 BCE – 27 BCE, Marcus Terentius Varro, De lingua Latina 7.96:

     “Obscaenum” dictum ab “scaena”; eam, ut Graeci, Accius scribit “scena”.

     Obscaenum ‘foul’ is said from scaena ‘stage’; this word Accius writes scena, like the Greeks.

2. scene
3. theatre
4. (transferred) natural scenery, background, backdrop
   • 29 BCE – 19 BCE, Virgil, Aeneid 1.164–165:

     [...] tum silvīs scēna coruscīs
     dēsuper; horrentīque ātrum nemus imminet umbrā.

     Further on [there is] a backdrop with waving woods above; a dark forest overhanging and trembling with shade.

5. publicity, the public eye
6. euphemism for death with dēcēdo

Declension

First-declension noun.

	singular	plural
nominative	scaena	scaenae
genitive	scaenae	scaenārum
dative	scaenae	scaenīs
accusative	scaenam	scaenās
ablative	scaenā	scaenīs
vocative	scaena	scaenae

Derived terms

• postscaenium

Descendants

• → Catalan: escena
• → German: Szene
  • → Russian: сцена (scena)
• → Italian: scena
  • → English: scena
  • → Turkish: şano
    • → Central Kurdish: شانۆ (şano)
      • → Northern Kurdish: şano
• → Middle French: scene
  • → English: scene
  • French: scène
    • → Dutch: scène
  • Norman: scène
• → Portuguese: cena
• → Romanian: scenă
• → Serbo-Croatian: сцена, scena
• → Spanish: escena

References

• “scaena”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “scaena”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• "scaena", 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)
• scaena in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• “scaena”, in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898), Harper’s Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers
• “scaena”, in William Smith et al., editor (1890), A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, London: William Wayte. G. E. Marindin