Etymologically
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δῆμος

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Pronunciation

  • IPA (5th-century BC Attic): /dɛ̂ː.mos/[1]
  • IPA (4th-century AD Koine): /ˈði.mos/[1]
  • IPA (10th-century Byzantine): /ˈði.mos/[1]

Forms

δῆμος (dêmos) m (genitive δήμου); second declension[1] Mycenaean Greek da-mo.[2][1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Proto-Hellenic *dā́mos, from Proto-Indo-European *déh₂mos, originally “part, division”.[1][3] It is probably a derivative in ⟨-mo-⟩ of the root Proto-Indo-European *deh₂- (“to divide”), seen in δαίομαι (daíomai, “to divide”).[3][4][2] The Doric form δᾶμος (dâmos) keeps the old ā.[3][5]

Its closest match is Celtic: Old Irish dám (“following, band of people”), and Welsh and Cornish words for “client” or “son-in-law”; since these are feminine ā-stems, the Indo-European word may first have been feminine.[3][4]

Ptolemy of Ascalon derived it from δέμας (démas, “body”), as if the people were a body, or from δασμός (dasmós, “division”), and Herodian from δέω (déō, “to bind”), the crowd bound together.[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

The Mycenaean tablets have it as da-mo.[2][1] In Homer it is a district or land, as in “rich land” of the Boeotians or of Lycia, and also the people who live there.[5][7] Ithaca and Crete are each a dēmos.[5][7]

Semantic evolution

Since the common people lived in the country and the chiefs in the town, it came to mean the commons as opposed to the king and the nobles; the Iliad already sets “a man of the people” against the leaders.[5][8] In Athens after Cleisthenes it was also the deme, the local community into which the tribes were divided.[8][2]

In Classical Greek it was the whole citizen body, the people as sovereign and as gathered in assembly, and so popular government, democracy, as opposed to the few; decrees began “it seemed good to the council and the people”.[8][5][9] Xenophon uses it for the rank and file of an army.[8] The New Testament uses it for a crowd and for the assembly of a Hellenistic city.[9]

Modern Greek δήμος (dímos) is a learned form for the municipality, its citizens, its services and the town hall.[10][6] English deme comes from it.[1]

Timeline

  • Mycenaean period – The tablets have da-mo.[2][1]
  • Homer – It means a land and its people, and the common people.[5][7]
  • 5th century BC – Herodotus describes Cleisthenes' distribution of the demes among the tribes.[2]
  • 5th century BC – Thucydides and Herodotus use it for the popular party and for democracy.[8][5]
  • 1st century AD – Acts uses it for the assembly of a Greek city.[9]
  • 1st century AD – Ptolemy of Ascalon derives it from démas “body”.[6]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A district, country, land.[5][8]
  2. A deme, a local district of Attica and other states.[8][2]
  3. The people, inhabitants of a land.[5][8]
  4. The common people, the commons, as opposed to kings and nobles.[5][8]
  5. The citizen body; the popular assembly.[8][9]
  6. Popular government, democracy.[8][5]
  7. The rank and file of an army.[8][5]
  8. (New Testament) A crowd.[9]

Word family

  • ἀπόδημος (apódēmos)
  • δημαγωγός (dēmagōgós)
  • δήμαρχος (dḗmarkhos)
  • δημεύω (dēmeúō)
  • δημογέρων (dēmogérōn)
  • δημοκοπέω (dēmokopéō)
  • δημοκρατέομαι (dēmokratéomai)
  • δημοκρατία (dēmokratía)
  • δημόσιος (dēmósios)
  • δημότης (dēmótēs)
  • δημίδιον (dēmídion)
  • δημίζω (dēmízō)
  • δήμιος (dḗmios)
  • δημόθεν (dēmóthen)
  • δημόομαι (dēmóomai)
  • δημότερος (dēmóteros)
  • δημοτεύομαι (dēmoteúomai)
  • δαίομαι (daíomai)
  • English deme

Usage notes

Ammonius distinguishes δῆμος, the people of a city, from the oxytone δημός “fat”, a different word of unknown origin.[11][3]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g Rodríguez Adrados, Francisco, et al., eds. (1980–), Diccionario Griego-Español, Madrid: CSIC, http://dge.cchs.csic.es/xdge
  3. ^ a b c d e 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 Frisk, Hjalmar (1960–1972), Griechisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3 vols, Heidelberg: Carl Winter
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert; Jones, Henry Stuart (1940), A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  6. ^ a b c Etygram: ancient etymologies of Greek words, CEPAM, Université Côte d'Azur, http://appsweb-cepam.unice.fr/etygram
  7. ^ a b c Cunliffe, Richard John (1924), A Lexicon of the Homeric Dialect, London: Blackie and Son
  8. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Diggle, James, et al., eds. (2021), The Cambridge Greek Lexicon, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
  9. ^ a b c d e Bauer, Walter; Danker, Frederick W., et al. (2000), A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, 3rd ed., Chicago: University of Chicago Press
  10. ^ Ινστιτούτο Νεοελληνικών Σπουδών (Ίδρυμα Μανόλη Τριανταφυλλίδη) (1998), Λεξικό της κοινής νεοελληνικής, Thessaloniki: Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
  11. ^ [Ammonius], De adfinium vocabulorum differentia, ed. K. Nickau (Leipzig: Teubner, 1966)