municipal

英文词源

municipal

municipal: [16] Latin mūnus meant ‘office, duty, gift’. Combined with -ceps ‘taker’ (a derivative of the verb capere ‘take’, source of English capture) it formed mūniceps, which denoted a ‘citizen of a Roman city (known as a mūnicipium) whose inhabitants had Roman citizenship but could not be magistrates’. From mūnicipium was derived the adjective mūnicipālis, source of English municipal; this was originally used for ‘of the internal affairs of a state, domestic’, and the modern application to the sphere of local government did not emerge strongly until the 19th century.

The stem of Latin mūnus also crops up in commūnis (source of English common), and so community and municipality are etymologically related. Mūnus in the later sense ‘gift’ formed the basis of the Latin adjective mūnificus ‘giving gifts’, hence ‘generous’, from which ultimately English gets munificent [16].
=> capture, common

municipal (adj.)

1540s, from Middle French municipal, from Latin municipalis "of a citizen of a free town, of a free town," also "of a petty town, provincial," from municipium "free town, city whose citizens have the privileges of Roman citizens but are governed by their own laws," from municeps "citizen, inhabitant of a free town." Second element is root of capere "assume, take" (see capable). First element is from munus (plural munia) "service performed for the community, duty, work," also "public spectacle paid for by the magistrate, (gladiatorial) entertainment, gift," from Old Latin moenus "service, duty, burden," from PIE *moi-n-es-, generally taken as a suffixed form of root *mei- (1) "to change, go, move" (Watkins; see mutable); but Tucker says "more probably" from the other PIE root *mei- meaning "bind," so that munia = "obligations" and communis = "bound together."