titulus

From Latin titulus. Doublet of tilde, titer/titre, title, titlo, and tittle.

titulus (plural tituli)

1. A caption, title or other inscription, especially an Ancient Roman type.

Most likely from Etruscan.[1]

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /ˈti.tu.lus/, [ˈt̪ɪt̪ʊɫ̪ʊs̠]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈti.tu.lus/, [ˈt̪iːt̪ulus]

titulus m (genitive titulī); second declension

1. title of a book
   • c. 35 CE – 100 CE, Quintilian, Institutio Oratoria 2.14.4, (in reference to Cicero's Rhetorica a.k.a. De Inventione):

     Nē pugnēmus igitur, cum praesertim plūrimīs aliōquī Graecīs sit ūtendum. Nam certē et philosophōs et mūsicōs et geōmetrās dīcam, nec vim adferam nōminibus hīs indecora in Latīnum sermōnem mūtātiōne. Dēnique cum M. Tullius etiam in ipsīs librōrum, quōs hāc dē rē prīmum scrīpserat, titulīs Graecō nōmine ūtātur, profectō nōn est verendum, nē temere videāmur ōrātōrī maximō dō nōmine artis suae crēdidisse.

     It is best therefore not to quarrel about it, more especially as we have to use Greek terms in many other cases. For I may at least use the words philosophus, musicus and geometres without outraging them by changing them into clumsy Latin equivalents. Finally, since Cicero gave a Greek title to the earlier works which he wrote on this subject, I may without fear of rashness accept the great orator as sufficient authority for the name of the art which he professed. (tr. by Harold Edgeworth Butler, 1920)

2. heading of a section
   • 86 CE – 103 CE, Martial, Epigrammata 13.3:

     Addita per titulōs sua nōmina rēbus habēbis:
     Praetereās, sī quid nōn facit ad stomachum.

     You'll find the names of the things [given as gifts] added throughout as headings: you can skip them, if anything doesn't suit the stomach.

   • 7th c., Theodore of Tarsus, archbishop of Canterbury (d. 690), Penitentiale preface, (as quoted by Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources):

     quae utiliora invenire potui ‥ singillatim titulos praeponens congessi

     I heaped together the things I found more useful while inserting headings to them one by one

   • 1963, L. Minio-Paluello, “Praefatio”, in Aristotelis Categoriae et Liber de Interpretatione (Oxford Classical Texts), →ISBN, page v:

     Titulos quibus liber uterque inscribi solet editor quidam Andronico antiquior addidisse videtur, cum nusquam apud Aristotelem inveniantur, Rhodio autem notos fuisse credere liceat; […]

     The headings which the book usually contains appear to have been added by an editor older than Andronicus, as they appear nowhere in Aristotle, though it may be believed that they were known to Rhodius

3. placard, tablet
4. inscription
5. epitaph

Second-declension noun.

• “titulus”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “titulus”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• titulus 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)
• titulus in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• “titulus”, in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898), Harper's Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers