Etymologically
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βᾶρις

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βᾶρις1 Egyptian boat

Pronunciation

  • 5th-century BC Attic: /bâː.ris/[1]
  • 4th-century AD Koine: /ˈβa.ris/[1]
  • 10th-century Byzantine: /ˈva.ris/[1]

Forms

βᾶρῐς (bâris) f (genitive βᾱ́ρῐδος); third declension[1] The genitive is βάριδος, Ionic βάριος; the Ionic plural is βάριες.[2][3]

Etymology

The boat is a word of Egyptian origin, borrowed from Egyptian bꜣjr (“transport ship”).[1][3][4] Beekes compares the Coptic word for a boat, Coptic ⲃⲁⲁⲣⲉ (baare).[3] Wiktionary traces the Greek word through Coptic and Demotic back to the Egyptian.[3][1] Furnée instead takes all these words to be loans from a Mediterranean substrate.[3] An intensified form βούβαρις (boúbaris) occurs once.[3]

From the Greek come Latin bāris and, through an unattested diminutive, barca (“bark, boat”).[3][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Aeschylus uses it in the Suppliant Women and the Persians of the ships of foreigners.[2][4][5]

Semantic evolution

Herodotus describes the flat-bottomed Nile barges by this name, and Ptolemaic papyri of the 3rd century BC use it of boats on the Nile.[2][4][5] Euripides speaks of “barbarian” barides, and Lycophron calls Odysseus' raft a baris.[2][5] Later writers use it of the boats of the dead and of Osiris, and Plutarch of a boat made of papyrus.[5]

The word was borrowed as Latin bāris and into English as the learned baris.[1]

Timeline

  • 6th–5th century BC – Aeschylus uses it of foreign sea-going ships.[4][2][5]
  • 5th century BC – Herodotus describes the Nile barges called barides.[2][4][5]
  • 3rd century BC – Papyri from Egypt use it of Nile boats.[2][5]
  • 1st century BC – Diodorus Siculus uses it of the boats that carry the dead.[5]
  • 6th century AD – Procopius still uses the word.[2][5]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A flat-bottomed boat used on the Nile, a barge.[2][4]
  2. Any foreign, non-Greek ship; poetically, a raft.[4][5]

βᾶρις2 large house, tower

Pronunciation

  • 5th-century BC Attic: /bâː.ris/[1]
  • 4th-century AD Koine: /ˈβa.ris/[1]
  • 10th-century Byzantine: /ˈva.ris/[1]

Forms

βᾶρῐς (bâris) f (genitive βᾱ́ρεως); third declension[1]

Etymology

The large house has an origin of its own, unrelated to the boat.[6][3] Beekes takes it as probably Illyrian, following Krahe, with ⟨ᾱ⟩ from ⟨αυ⟩, and compares the gloss βαυρία (bauría, “house”), said to be Messapian, and βύριον (búrion); alternatively, a Pre-Greek form with ⟨w⟩ would explain the interchange of ⟨βαρ-⟩, ⟨βαυρ-⟩ and ⟨βυρ-⟩.[3][1] The DGE suggests instead a link with Hittite pir (“house”) and parna (“building”), borrowed through Luwian or another language of Asia Minor.[5] Wiktionary notes that a link with Albanian words for a dwelling is unlikely.[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

An inscription from Didyma of the 3rd century BC uses it of a farmstead, listed with a village and its land.[5] Stephanus of Byzantium reports that Posidippus used it of a house and Ephorus of a block of dwellings.[2][6]

Semantic evolution

In the Septuagint it is a fortified building, a tower or palace: a scroll is found in the baris at Ecbatana, and a psalm speaks of ivory towers.[5][2] Josephus uses it of a tower, and an inscription from Apollonia in Bulgaria still has it in the 1st–2nd century AD.[2][5] It also occurs as a place name in many parts of the Greek world.[3][6]

Timeline

  • 3rd century BC – An inscription from Didyma uses it of a farmstead.[5]
  • 3rd–2nd century BC – The Septuagint uses it of towers and fortified palaces.[2][5]
  • 1st century AD – Josephus uses it of a tower.[2][5]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A farmstead or country house.[5][1]
  2. A large fortified building, a tower or palace.[2][5]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert; Jones, Henry Stuart (1940), A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Beekes, Robert S. P. (2010), Etymological Dictionary of Greek, with the assistance of Lucien van Beek, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 10, Leiden; Boston: Brill
  4. ^ a b c d e f g Diggle, James, et al., eds. (2021), The Cambridge Greek Lexicon, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s Rodríguez Adrados, Francisco, et al., eds. (1980–), Diccionario Griego-Español, Madrid: CSIC, http://dge.cchs.csic.es/xdge
  6. ^ a b c Chantraine, Pierre (2009), Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue grecque: histoire des mots, new ed. with a supplement (Chroniques d'étymologie grecque 1–10), Paris: Klincksieck