praecipio

Praecipio, praecipere, praecepi, praeceptum, third conjugation of the -io type, so the forms run like capio: praecipis, praecipit, praecipiunt. It is prae plus capio, "take in advance", and both halves of that survive as separate senses.

The literal one is to seize or enjoy something ahead of time: praecipere gaudium, to take a joy before it arrives. The commoner one is to lay down a rule, which is where the rank comes from - it takes a dative of the person taught and a ut or ne clause with the subjunctive. The noun praeceptum, "precept", comes straight off the supine. Medieval scribes drop the diphthong and write precipio, and this corpus carries both spellings.