supine

Meanings

Adjective

• Lying on its back.
• Reluctant to take action due to indifference or moral weakness; apathetic or passive towards something.
• Inclining or leaning backward; inclined, sloping.

Noun

• In Latin and other languages: a type of verbal noun used in the ablative and accusative cases, which shares the same stem as the passive participle.
• In Swedish, Faroese, Icelandic and Old Norse: a verb form that combines with an inflection of ha/hafa/hava to form the present perfect and pluperfect tenses.
• (obsolete terminology) The 'to'-prefixed infinitive in English or other Germanic languages, so named because the infinitive was regarded as a verbal noun and the 'to'-prefixed form of it was seen as the dative form of the verbal noun; the full infinitive.

Related

Opposite words

• nonsupine
• prone

Origin

• The adjective is borrowed from Latin supīnus, from *sup- (see sub) + -īnus. The word is cognate with Catalan supí, Italian supino, Old French sovin, Middle French souvin, Anglo-Norman supin, Old Occitan sobin, sopin, Portuguese supino, Spanish supino. Partly displaced , whence Modern English upward.
• The noun is from Late Middle English supin ("supine of a Latin verb") or Middle French supin ("(grammar) supine"), from Latin supīnum, (ellipsis of supīnum verbum), from supīnus; further etymology above.