asper

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈæspə/
• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈæspɚ/

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From Middle English aspre, from Old French aspre (modern French âpre), from Latin asper (“rough”).

• aspre

asper (comparative more asper, superlative most asper)

1. (obsolete) Rough or harsh; severe, stern, serious.
   • 1627 (indicated as 1626), Francis [Bacon], “(please specify the page, or |century=I to X)”, in Sylua Syluarum: Or A Naturall Historie. In Ten Centuries. […], London: […] William Rawley […]; [p]rinted by J[ohn] H[aviland] for William Lee […], →OCLC:

     An asper sound.

asper (uncountable)

1. (phonetics, obsolete) Rough breathing; a mark (#) indicating that part of a word is aspirated, or pronounced with h before it.

• spiritus asper

From Middle English asper, from Middle French aspre or Italian aspro, both from Ancient Greek ἄσπρον (áspron), from neuter of ἄσπρος (áspros, “white”), from Latin asper (“rough, newly minted”).

• aspron

asper (plural aspers)

1. (historical) Any one of several small coins, circulated around the eastern Mediterranean area from the 12th to 17th centuries.
   • 1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 40, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book I, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC:

     And for ten Aspers you shall daily finde some amongst them, that will give themselves a deepe gash with a Scimitarie, either in their armes or thighes.

• rapes, après, Pears, prase, Spera, presa, apers, spaer, RESPA, pears, Spare, après-, reaps, præs., apres, parse, Rapes, Earps, Presa, aprés, spear, Spear, Peras, spare, pares, sarpe

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

asper

1. grim

“asper” in Cornish Dictionary / Gerlyver Kernewek, Akademi Kernewek.

Probably from a Proto-Indo-European *h₂esp- (“to cut”), also present in Ancient Greek ἀσπίς (aspís, “shield”) and Hittite [script needed] (ḫasp-, “to cut down”).^[1]

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): [ˈas.pɛr]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): [ˈas.per]

asper (feminine aspera, neuter asperum, comparative asperior, superlative asperrimus, adverb asperē); first/second-declension adjective (nominative masculine singular in -er)

1. rough, uneven, coarse
2. unrefined, rude
3. sharp, newly minted
4. harsh, bitter, fierce

   Synonyms: ācer, acerbus, frāctus

   odia aspera ― bitter hatred

First/second-declension adjective (nominative masculine singular in -er).

• “asper”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “asper”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891), An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• “asper”, in Gaffiot, Félix (1934), Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• Carl Meißner; Henry William Auden (1894), Latin Phrase-Book‎^[1], London: Macmillan and Co.
  • (ambiguous) rough and hilly ground: loca aspera et montuosa (Planc. 9. 22)
    
• “asper”, in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898), Harper’s Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers
• “asper”, in William Smith, editor (1848), A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, London: John Murray

• pares

asper m or f

1. indefinite plural of asp