absinthium

See also: Absinthium

English

absinthium (uncountable)

(now rare) Common wormwood (Artemisia absinthium), an intensely bitter herb used in the production of absinthe and vermouth, and as a tonic. [First attested around 1150 to 1350.]^[1]
The dried leaves and flowering tops of the wormwood plant.^[2]
absinthe oil

Artemisia absinthium — see wormwood

dried wormwood

absinthe oil — see absinthe oil

^ Lesley Brown, editor-in-chief, William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, editors (2002), “absinthium”, in The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles, 5th edition, Oxford, New York, N.Y.: Oxford University Press, →ISBN, page 9.
^ Philip Babcock Gove (editor), Webster's Third International Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged (G. & C. Merriam Co., 1976 [1909], →ISBN), page 5

From Ancient Greek ἀψίνθιον (apsínthion, “wormwood”).

absinthium n (genitive absinthiī or absinthī); second declension

wormwood
- Apicius Caelius, De Re Coquinaria 1.3:
  Conditi Camerini praeceptis, utique pro absinthio cessante; in cuius vicem absinthi Pontici purgati terendique unciam, Thebaicam dabis, masticis, folii scripulos III, vini eius modi sextarios XVIII. Carbones amaritudo non exigit.
  2009 translation by Joseph Dommers Vehling
  Roman vermouth [or Absinth] is made thus: according to the recipe of Camerinum you need wormwood from Santo for Roman vermouth or, as a substitute, wormwood from the Pontus cleaned and curshed, 1 Theban ounce of it, 6 scuples of masitch, 3 each of [nard] leaves, costmary and saffron and 18 quarts of any kind of mild wine. [Filter cold] charcoal is required because of the bitterness.
an infusion of wormwood sometimes masked with honey due to its bitter taste
(figuratively) something which is bitter but wholesome
- c. 35 CE – 100 CE, Quintilian, Institutio Oratoria 3.1.5:
  Sed nos veremur ne parum hic liber mellis et absinthii multum habere videatur
  But I fear that this book will have too little sweetness and too much wormwood.

¹Found in older Latin (until the Augustan Age).

Dalmatian:
- ascianz
Italo-Romance:
- Italian: assenzio
  - → Maltese: assenzju
Padanian:
- Lombard: ascens
- Piedmontese: assens, ansens, insens
Southern Gallo-Romance:
- Aragonese: ixenzo, xenzo, axenz, asensio
  Ribagorçan: xento, ixenso, asenso
- Occitan: aussent, aissent
  Gascon: eishent
  
  Provençal: ensens, insens, issens
  
  Vivaro-Alpine: uissent
Ibero-Romance:
- Asturian: axenxu, asensio
- Galician: asente, asentes, asento, axenxo
- Portuguese: encenço, acinto, acintro
- Spanish: ajenjo

→ Catalan: absinti
→ Galician: absintio
→ Georgian: აბზინდა (abzinda)
→ Middle Dutch: absinthium
- → Dutch: absint
→ Middle English: absinthium
- English: absinthium
→ Middle French: absinthe
- French: absinthe (see there for further descendants)
- → Middle English: absinthe
  - English: absinthe
→ Middle Irish: aipsint
- → Irish: apsaint
→ Norman: absînthe
→ Occitan: absinti, absinta
→ Piedmontese: absent, absenta
→ Portuguese: absíntio
→ Spanish: absintio
→ Translingual: Absinthium

“absinthium”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
absinthium 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)
“absinthium”, in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898), Harper's Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers