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CLAVIS: The Latin Word for ‘Key’ & 4 Special Pages of English Words like Conclave Derived From it
In their Vatican conclave, cardinals of the Roman Catholic Church on Tuesday, April 19 elected Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger of Germany as Pope Benedict XVI. Our word feature today will explore through four separate pages the Latin word for key, clavis, and its descendants in English, words like conclave, clavicle, autoclave, enclave, exclave, the surname Clavell, subclavian arteries, Bach's The Well-Tempered Clavier, and even Moon Base Clavius in Stanley Kubrick's film "2001: A Space Odyssey." It's an awesome trip, dudes. Cardinal Ratzinger is the 265th pope of the Catholic Church and the first from Germany since the 11th century. Pope Benedict XVI was born in Marktl Am Inn in Bavaria, but his father, a policeman, moved frequently and the family left when he was 2. Later Joseph Ratzinger left his home of Tübingen during student protests in the late 1960s and moved back to the more conservative University of Regensburg in his birthplace of Bavaria. In one of the most beautiful rooms ever created by the human hands, the Sistine Chapel, 135 cardinals took apparently only five ballots to elect the new pontiff. The word conclave is a Late Ecclesiastical Latin neuter noun conclave, Latin plural conclavia. Its prime meaning is ‘any place or room that could be locked with a key.’ Conclave < con=cum, Latin ‘with’ + clavis ‘key.’
Pope Benedict XVI on the balcony of St. Peter's Basilica
The Keys of the Kingdom
The armorial bearings of Vatican City show two crossed keys, a visual reference to the line in St. Matthew 16.18, “et tibi dabo claves regni caelorum.” The Latin noun clavis ‘key’ (Latin plural claves) appears in familiar verses of the New Testament. In Matthew 16: 18,19 Christ bestows papal authority on his apostle Peter. In the Latin Bible authorized by the Roman Catholic Church and known as the Vulgate, these verses are: 18 et ego dico tibi quia tu es Petrus et super hanc petram aedificabo ecclesiam meam et portae inferi non praevalebunt adversum eam. (KJV) And I say also unto thee that thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. 19 et tibi dabo claves regni caelorum. . . (KJV) And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven. . . Matthew 18:16 also contains the great Latin Bible pun. Petros is the apostle name in Greek, Petrus in Latin, and petra is a Latin word meaning ‘rock.’ So Petrus is the petra (rock) on which the church will be built.
(This is the first of 4 pages on "clavis.")
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