pensum

English

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin pensum. Doublet of peso.

Noun

pensum (plural pensums)

1. (dated) A task or imposition set as a school punishment.
   • 1955, Samuel Beckett, translated by Patrick Bowles, Molloy:

     You invent nothing, you think you are inventing, you think you are escaping, and all you do is stammer out your lesson, the remnants of a pensum one day got by heart and long forgotten, life without tears, as it wept.

Danish

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin pēnsum.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /pɛnsɔm/,

Noun

pensum n (singular definite pensummet, plural indefinite pensa)

1. syllabus, curriculum
2. task, assignment
3. examination requirements

Inflection

French

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin pēnsum. Doublet of poids, which was inherited.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /pɛ̃.sɔm/

• Audio

  (file)

Noun

pensum m (plural pensums)

1. (archaic) pensum (at school); lines (UK)
2. chore

Further reading

• “pensum”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé , 2012.

Latin

Etymology

Neuter of past participle of pendō.

Pronunciation

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /ˈpen.sum/,
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈpen.sum/,

Noun

pēnsum n (genitive pēnsī); second declension

1. allotment, portion, weight (of wool measured out to a slave to spin in a day)
   • 8 CE, Ovid, Fasti 2.743:

     lūmen ad exiguum famulae data pēnsa trahēbant

     By a dim light the handmaids were spinning their given allotments of wool.

2. work quota, a day’s work
3. task, job, duty, assignment, engagement

Declension

Second-declension noun (neuter).

Related terms

• pēnsō

Descendants

Via Vulgar Latin *pēsum:

References

• “pensum”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “pensum”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• pensum 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)
• pensum in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• “pensum”, in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898), Harper's Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers

Norwegian Bokmål

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin pēnsum.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /pɛnsʉm/,

Noun

pensum n (definite singular pensumet, indefinite plural pensa or pensumer, definite plural pensaene or pensuma or pensumene)

1. syllabus, curriculum
2. task, assignment
3. examination requirements

References

• “pensum” in The Bokmål Dictionary.
• “pensum” in Det Norske Akademis ordbok (NAOB).

Norwegian Nynorsk

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin pēnsum.

Noun

pensum n (definite singular pensumet, indefinite plural pensum, definite plural pensuma)

1. syllabus, curriculum
2. task, assignment
3. examination requirements

Inflection

References

• “pensum” in The Nynorsk Dictionary.