I.a bending from a thing, a bending aside; an oblique inclination or direction (good prose).
I. Lit.: “lanceam exigua corporis declinatione vitare,” Curt. 9, 7 fin.; cf.: “quot ego tuas petitiones parva quadam declinatione effugi,” Cic. Cat. 1, 6, 15: “declinare dixit (Epicurus) atomum perpaulum, et ipsa declinatio ad libidinem fingitur, etc.,” id. Fin. 1, 6, 19; so of the oblique motion of atoms, id. Fat. 10, 22; 22, 47.—
B. Like the Gr. κλίμα, the supposed slope of the earth towards the poles, a region of the earth or sky, a climate: “declinatio mundi,” Col. 1 prooem. § 22; so, “mundi,” id. 3, 1, 3; cf.: “positio caeli et declinatio,” id. 1, 6, 18; “so correspond. with regio caeli,” Col. 4, 24, 2; cf. “also caeli,” the altitude of the pole, Vitr. 9, 7, 1.—
II. Trop.
A. In gen., a turning away from any thing; an avoiding, avoidance: ut bona natura appetimus, sic a malis natura declinamus; “quae declinatio, si cum ratione fiet, cautio appelletur,” Cic. Tusc. 4, 6, 13; cf. “so opp. appetitio,” id. N. D. 3, 13, 33; and in plur. Gell. 14, 1, 23: “laboris, periculi,” Cic. Clu. 53 fin.—
B. t. t.
1. Of rhetor. lang., a short digression: “declinatio brevis a proposito, non ut superior illa digressio,” Cic. de Or. 3, 53 fin.; id. Part. 15; cf. Quint. 9, 1, 32 and 34.—
2. Of gramm. lang.: variation, inflection.
(α).
In the older grammarians, every change of form which a word undergoes; as declension, strictly so called, conjugation, comparison, derivation, etc., Varr. L. L. 8, § 2 sq.; 10, § 11 sq.; Cic. de Or. 3, 54; cf. “also of declension in its stricter sense,” Quint. 1, 4, 29; 1, 5, 63; “of conjugation,” id. 1, 4, 13; “of derivation,” id. 8, 3, 32; 2, 15, 4.—
(β).
Among the later grammarians, of declension, properly so called, as distinguished from conjugatio, comparatio, derivatio, etc. So, Donatus: in declinatione compositivorum nominum, p. 174 P. (p. 13 Lind.).
