halcyon

Pronunciation

• IPA: /ˈhælsi.ən/ (UK)^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin halcyon,^{[2][3][4][5][6]} from Ancient Greek ἁλκυών (halkuṓn, “kingfisher”),^{[2][3][4][5][6]} a variant of alkuṓn “kingfisher”, a word of unknown origin.^[2][3][4][6] It replaced Middle English alcioun, which came from the Latin variant alcyon.^[2][4][6] The initial h- came from association with háls “sea, salt” and kúōn “conceiving”,^[2][3][6] which Etymonline regards as an ancient folk etymology for a word borrowed from a non-Indo-European language.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

A mythical bird, identified with the kingfisher, said to breed at the winter solstice in a nest floating on the sea and to calm the wind and waves while it nested.^{[2][7][4][5][6]}

Semantic evolution

The adjective grew out of halcyon days, translating Latin alcyonei dies, the fourteen calm days around the winter solstice when the bird was said to breed.^[4][3][7] From calm weather the word passed to any calm, peaceful time,^[7][4] and then to times remembered as happy, golden or prosperous.^[2][5][6]

Timeline

• 1390 – the fabled bird;^[7] Etymonline dates Middle English alcioun to the late 14th century.^[4]
• 1540 – halcyon days;^[7] Barnhart has halcyons dayes in 1545.^[3]
• 1578 – calm, peaceful.^[7]
• 1601 – the first date in Merriam-Webster for the adjective.^[5]
• 1616 – verb, to calm.^[7]
• 1631 – the adjective used on its own, by Barnhart's evidence.^[3]
• 1772–84 – in zoology, a kingfisher of the genus Halcyon.^[7]

Modern meaning

Adjective

1. Calm, peaceful and tranquil.
2. Happy and carefree; golden.
3. Prosperous.
4. Of or relating to the halcyon bird.

Noun

1. A mythical bird, identified with the kingfisher, believed to calm the sea while nesting on it at the winter solstice.
2. A kingfisher, especially of the genus Halcyon.

Related words

• Alcyone
• kingfisher

References

1. [1] Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
3. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] Barnhart, Robert K., ed. (1995), The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology, New York: HarperCollins
4. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] Harper, Douglas, Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (2003), 11th ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary (1999), 2nd ed., New York: Random House
7. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press