English
lapidable
Lapidable comes from Latin lapis ‘stone’, and goes back to Proto-Italic *lapets.
- Proto-Italicc. 1500–700 BCE*lapets‘stone’reconstructed
- Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CElapis‘stone’
- Englishearliest quotation 1614lapidable
attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed
Earlier history uncertain.
Lineage
- Proto-Italicc. 1500–700 BCE*lapets‘stone’reconstructed
- Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CElapis‘stone’
- Englishearliest quotation 1614lapidable
Earliest quotation: 1614, Richard Cocks, Anthony Farrington: “I bought a wench yisterday, cost me 3 taies,…”
The story
The sense "nubile" was an intellectual pun on the use of English stone to mean "testicle", potentially also influenced by lap (‘female pudenda’).
Every English word from Proto-Italic *lapets
Today it means
adj Nubile, mature for sexual intercourse (of a woman).
Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word.
Etymograph / Proto-Italic *lapets / lapidable