culpa

English

Etymology

Learned borrowing from Latin culpa.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈkʌlpə/
• Rhymes: -ʌlpə

Noun

culpa (plural culpae)

1. (law) Negligence or fault, as distinguishable from dolus (deceit, fraud), which implies intent, culpa being imputable to defect of intellect, dolus to defect of heart.
   • 1849, James G. Butler, A Summary of the Roman Civil Law:

     Every actual delict presupposes a dolus or culpa, with the concomitant consciousness and prepense

Related terms

• felix culpa

Translations

Anagrams

• capul

Aragonese

Etymology

Learned borrowing from Latin culpa.

Noun

culpa f (plural culpas)

1. blame, fault

Further reading

• Bal Palazios, Santiago (2002) “culpa”, in Dizionario breu de a luenga aragonesa, Zaragoza, →ISBN

Catalan

Etymology 1

Learned borrowing from Latin culpa.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): (Central, Balearic)
• IPA^(key): (Valencian)

Noun

culpa f (plural culpes)

1. fault, blame
2. guilt

Derived terms

• per culpa de

Related terms

Further reading

• “culpa” in Diccionari de la llengua catalana, segona edició, Institut d’Estudis Catalans.

Etymology 2

Verb

culpa

1. inflection of culpar:
   1. third-person singular present indicative
   2. second-person singular imperative

Galician

Etymology 1

From Old Galician-Portuguese culpa, a learned borrowing from Latin culpa.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key):

Noun

culpa f (plural culpas)

1. blame, guilt

   A culpa morre solteira (proverb) ― Guilt dies unmarried

References

• “culpa” in Dicionario de Dicionarios do galego medieval, SLI - ILGA 2006–2022.
• “culpa” in Xavier Varela Barreiro & Xavier Gómez Guinovart: Corpus Xelmírez - Corpus lingüístico da Galicia medieval. SLI / Grupo TALG / ILG, 2006–2018.
• “culpa” in Dicionario de Dicionarios do galego medieval, SLI - ILGA 2006–2022.
• “culpa” in Tesouro informatizado da lingua galega. Santiago: ILG.
• “culpa” in Álvarez, Rosario (coord.): Tesouro do léxico patrimonial galego e portugués, Santiago de Compostela: Instituto da Lingua Galega.

Etymology 2

Verb

culpa

1. inflection of culpar:
   1. third-person singular present indicative
   2. second-person singular imperative

Latin

Etymology 1

From Proto-Italic *kʷolpā (“wrong, mistake”), from Proto-Indo-European *kʷolp-eh₂ (“bend, turn”), from *kʷelp-.

Pronunciation

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /ˈkul.pa/,
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈkul.pa/,

Noun

culpa f (genitive culpae); first declension

1. fault, defect, weakness, frailty, temptation
2. blame, guilt
   • Titivillus in culpa est.

     Titivillus is at fault .

3. crime, punishable act, mischief, sin

   Synonyms: dēlictum, peccātum, scelus, vitium, noxa, crīmen, facinus, iniūria, malum, error, flāgitium, dēlinquentia, commissum, maleficium

   Antonyms: bonum, rēctum, virtūs

4. specifically, regarding sexual misconduct or unchastity
   • 29 BCE – 19 BCE, Virgil, Aeneid 4.18-19:

     “ sī nōn pertaesum thalamī taedaeque fuisset,
     huic ūnī forsan potuī succumbere culpae.”

     “ if it had not been weariness of the marriage torch and bridal chamber, I would have been able to succumb to this one fault.”
     (Did had pledged never to remarry; cf. Aeneid 4.172. Page, T.E. , notes culpae as “a favorite euphemism in connection with love.”)

Declension

First-declension noun.

Derived terms

• culpō
• meā culpā

Descendants

• Italo-Romance:
  • Italian: colpa
  • Sicilian: curpa
• North Italian:
  • Romansch: cuolpa
• Gallo-Romance:
  • Old Catalan: colpa
  • Old French: colpe, coupe, cope, corpe
    • Middle French: coupe, courpe, coulpe (Latinized)
      • French: coulpe
  • Occitan: colpa
• Borrowings:
  • → Aragonese: culpa
  • → Catalan: culpa
  • → Old Galician-Portuguese: culpa
    • Galician: culpa
    • Portuguese: culpa
  • → Romanian: culpă
  • → Old Spanish: culpa
    • Spanish: culpa

References

• Walther von Wartburg (1928–2002) “cŭlpa”, in Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch (in German), volume 2: C Q K, page 1497

Further reading

• “culpa”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “culpa”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• culpa 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)
• culpa in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• Carl Meißner, Henry William Auden (1894) Latin Phrase-Book‎, London: Macmillan and Co.
  • a guilty conscience: conscientia mala or peccatorum, culpae, sceleris, delicti
    
  • to be conscious of no ill deed: nullius culpae sibi conscium esse
    
  • to be free from blame: extra culpam esse
    
  • to be almost culpable: affinem esse culpae
    
  • to put the blame on another: culpam in aliquem conferre, transferre, conicere
    
  • to attribute the fault to some one: culpam alicui attribuere, assignare
    
  • to commit some blameworthy action: culpam committere, contrahere
    
  • to commit some blameworthy action: facinus, culpam in se admittere
    
  • to bear the blame of a thing: culpam alicuius rei sustinere
    
  • to exonerate oneself from blame: culpam a se amovere
    
  • (ambiguous) to be at fault; to blame; culpable: in culpa esse
    
  • (ambiguous) some one is to blame in a matter; it is some one's fault: culpa alicuius rei est in aliquo
    
  • (ambiguous) it is my fault: mea culpa est
    
  • (ambiguous) to be free from blame: culpa carere, vacare
    
  • (ambiguous) to be free from blame: abesse a culpa
    
  • (ambiguous) to be almost culpable: prope abesse a culpa
    
• “culpa”, in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898), Harper's Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers
• “culpa”, in William Smith et al., editor (1890), A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, London: William Wayte. G. E. Marindin

Etymology 2

See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

Verb

culpā

1. second-person singular present active imperative of culpō

Portuguese

Etymology 1

Learned borrowing from Latin culpa.

Pronunciation

• Hyphenation: cul‧pa

Noun

culpa f (plural culpas)

1. fault
2. guilt

Quotations

For quotations using this term, see Citations:culpa.

Etymology 2

Verb

culpa

1. inflection of culpar:
   1. third-person singular present indicative
   2. second-person singular imperative

Romanian

Noun

culpa f

1. definite nominative/accusative singular of culpă

Spanish

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈkulpa/

• Audio (Colombia):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ulpa
• Syllabification: cul‧pa

Etymology 1

Learned borrowing from Latin culpa; cf. the inherited Old Spanish colpa.

Noun

culpa f (plural culpas)

1. fault
2. guilt
3. blame

Derived terms

• culposo, culposa
• echar la culpa
• libre de culpa (“off the hook, blameless”)

Related terms

References

Etymology 2

See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

Verb

culpa

1. inflection of culpar:
   1. third-person singular present indicative
   2. second-person singular imperative

Further reading

• “culpa”, in Diccionario de la lengua española, Vigésima tercera edición, Real Academia Española, 2014