Thi manlynesse [L. humanitatem tuam] shewid to alle men
Robert Kaster's review of Myles McDonnell, Roman Manliness: Virtus and the Roman Republic.
Myles McDonnell's reply
In the end though, how many people care about the historical account of how equivocal uses of a word came about, and what those uses are? After all, naming is flexible, and a word can come to have as many meanings or definitions as the mind sees fit. Those who fail to recognize this may argue that naming must be purely univocal but it is an unreasonable demand.
(This is not to say that definitions for a specific thing are equally good--just that a name can be applied to different things, and it is not necessary for it to be applied to one thing only.)
