# What is the difference between sempiternam and aeternam **URL:** \ **Category:** Learning Latin\ **Created:** [August 13, 2014, 4:43am UTC](https://www.textkit.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-sempiternam-and-aeternam/12854 "2014-08-13T04:43:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Lord\_WayneY](https://www.textkit.com/user_avatar/www.textkit.com/lord_wayney/32/513_2.png) [@Lord\_WayneY](https://www.textkit.com/u/Lord_WayneY)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2014, 4:43am UTC](https://www.textkit.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-sempiternam-and-aeternam/12854/1 "2014-08-13T04:43:21Z")
These words I came across in hymns like “Requiem” and “Pie Jesu” and so on. Sometimes I saw “dona eis requiem, sempiternam” and sometimes “dona eis requiem aeternam”. Are there any difference between the two words? So far as I have seen, it seems the same, both the meaning and the usage. Am I right? ---
**Author:** ![Qimmik](https://www.textkit.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/q/43a26b/32.png) [@Qimmik](https://www.textkit.com/u/Qimmik)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2014, 1:49pm UTC](https://www.textkit.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-sempiternam-and-aeternam/12854/2 "2014-08-13T13:49:46Z")
Basically, I believe you are correct. Lewis & Short’s Latin dictionary draws this distinction, attributing it to a 19th century German treatise on Latin synonyms: > sempiternus denotes what is perpetual, what exists as long as time endures, and keeps even pace with it; aeternus, the eternal, that which is raised above all time, and can be measured only by aeons (αἰῶνες, indefinite periods . . .[T]he sublime thought, without beginning and end, is more vividly suggested by aeternus than by sempiternus, since the former has more direct reference to the long duration of the eternal, which has neither beginning nor end. \> _Sempiternus_ \> is rather a mathematical, \> _aeternus_ \> a metaphysical, designation of eternity However, I doubt whether this is a distinction that was consistently drawn in classical or medieval authors. At a superficial glance, L&S’s citations of _sempiternus_ from Cicero (see link below) don’t seem to confirm this distinction completely: _cursus stellarum_, _ignis Vestae_, _nihil umquam nisi sempiternum et divinum animo volutare_; and even Terence: _deorum vita sempiterna_. It’s possible that in **classical** Latin, _aeternus_ acquired a more poetic, “sublime” flavor because _sempiternus_ is a word that has a metrical shape (long short long, a “cretic”) that can’t fit in hexameter verse, and therefore it couldn’t be used by poets such as Lucretius, Vergil, Ovid, etc. This may account, at least partly, for the distinction Lewis and Short purport to draw. Perhaps the similarity of _aevum_ to the Greek word αἰών, aeon (to which _aevum_ is apparently etymologically related) may also have played a part, as L&S suggests. (_Aeternus_ = _aevi-ternus_.) The Oxford Latin Dictionary doesn’t attempt to draw a distinction between these two words. _Sempiternus_ occurs as early as Plautus and Terence (around 200 BCE); the earliest attested use of _aeternus_ (originally _aeviternus_) seems to be in Lucretius and Varro (early 1st century BCE). Links to Lewis & Short: [http://perseus.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/philologic/getobject.pl?c.17:1505.lewisandshort](http://perseus.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/philologic/getobject.pl?c.17:1505.lewisandshort) [http://perseus.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/philologic/getobject.pl?c.0:1415.lewisandshort](http://perseus.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/philologic/getobject.pl?c.0:1415.lewisandshort) Lewis & Short is a classical Latin dictionary, with a cut-off date somewhere in late antiquity, but I don’t think medieval Latin usage should be different. ---
**Author:** ![spa38](https://www.textkit.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@spa38](https://www.textkit.com/u/spa38)\ **Post date:** [September 12, 2015, 3:48pm UTC](https://www.textkit.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-sempiternam-and-aeternam/12854/3 "2015-09-12T15:48:57Z")
Latin meaning has been preserved in spanish. Sempiternam means having no end, i.e. something that has a beginning, but will last forever. Aeternam means having neither beginning nor end. ---
**Author:** ![davidw53](https://www.textkit.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/90db22/32.png) [@davidw53](https://www.textkit.com/u/davidw53)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2016, 1:15pm UTC](https://www.textkit.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-sempiternam-and-aeternam/12854/4 "2016-09-16T13:15:24Z")
“Same as” eternal - as the eternal is entirely abstract ---
**Author:** ![mwh](https://www.textkit.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/6f9a4e/32.png) [@mwh](https://www.textkit.com/u/mwh)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2016, 10:20pm UTC](https://www.textkit.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-sempiternam-and-aeternam/12854/5 "2016-09-16T22:20:44Z")
The difference between “for ever and ever” and “for ever”? ---
**Author:** ![anphph](https://www.textkit.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/3d9bf3/32.png) [@anphph](https://www.textkit.com/u/anphph)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2016, 8:40am UTC](https://www.textkit.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-sempiternam-and-aeternam/12854/6 "2016-09-20T08:40:41Z")
> [@Qimmik](#): > > It’s possible that in **classical** Latin, _aeternus_ acquired a more poetic, “sublime” flavor because _sempiternus_ is a word that has a metrical shape (long short long, a “cretic”) that can’t fit in hexameter verse, and therefore it couldn’t be used by poets such as Lucretius, Vergil, Ovid, etc. This may account, at least partly, for the distinction Lewis and Short purport to draw. I think this question occurred to me before, but never really thought about asking it: is there a list or compilation of such words, whose metrical shapes makes them impossible for specific verse forms? I think I would be content to know which ones are impossible to fit into hexameters. (And in the off chance that there is such a list also for Greek, I would be likewise interested). ---
**Author:** ![Matthew\_Gendzwill](https://www.textkit.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/c57346/32.png) [@Matthew\_Gendzwill](https://www.textkit.com/u/Matthew_Gendzwill)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2016, 4:31am UTC](https://www.textkit.com/t/what-is-the-difference-between-sempiternam-and-aeternam/12854/7 "2016-10-03T04:31:01Z")
> [@spa38](#): > > Latin meaning has been preserved in spanish. > > Sempiternam means having no end, i.e. something that has a beginning, but will last forever. > > Aeternam means having neither beginning nor end. Very nice distinction. “Oh God creations’ Secret Source, Yourself Unmoved, all motions source, Who from the morn till evenings ray, through every change direct the day. Your light at even’ tide impart, that light from us may ne’re depart and let a holy death accord, eternal glory with the Lord.” From the office of None at St. Josephs’ Abbey.