Etymologically
Log in

δῶμα

This is the current revision of this entry, as edited by bogdan on 24 October 2026 at 20:20. This address is a permanent link to this version.
Changes in this edit History

Pronunciation

  • 5th-century BC Attic: /dɔ̂ː.ma/[1]
  • 4th-century AD Koine: /ˈðo.ma/[1]
  • 10th-century Byzantine: /ˈðo.ma/[1]

Forms

δῶμᾰ (dôma) n (genitive δώμᾰτος); third declension[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Proto-Indo-European *dem- (“house”), the root also seen in δόμος (dómos) “house” and δεσπότης (despótēs) “master”.[2][3][4] How it was formed is disputed.[5][3] Frisk and Chantraine take it as an enlargement of the root noun of δεσπότης; following Brugmann, Frisk starts from the lengthened-grade accusative *dṓm, which was later taken for a neuter because of its ending ⟨-μα⟩.[5][3] Chantraine and the DGE also suggest that it was remade from the Homeric δῶ (dô) “house” after the nouns in ⟨-μα⟩, as Wiktionary has it.[3][6][1]

Its nearest cognate is Old Armenian տուն (tun, “house”), an n-stem, though that form can be explained in several ways.[2][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

In Homer it is a house or home, often in the plural for a single palace, and also the main room or hall; the gods hold “Olympian halls”, and Hades has his house below.[7][8][3]

Semantic evolution

It remained a poetic word: Herodotus uses it once, and Attic prose never.[7][8] In tragedy it is also the household or family, and in Pindar and the tragedians a temple; an Arcadian inscription from Tegea has it in that sense too.[8][2][3] Ammonius distinguishes δώματα, buildings in general, from δωμάτιον (dōmátion), a bedroom.[9]

In later Greek it meant the flat roof of a house: the Septuagint, the papyri and the New Testament use it so, where to proclaim “on the housetops” is to proclaim in public.[7][10][3] It was borrowed as Latin dōma.[1] The Modern Greek δώμα (dóma) continues that Hellenistic sense, a flat roof or a room built on a roof terrace, and is used as a learned term for the hall of an ancient house; the diminutive gave Modern Greek δωμάτιο (domátio) “room”.[11][3][4]

Timeline

  • Homer – The Iliad uses it for houses and the halls of the gods.[7][8]
  • 5th century BC – An Arcadian inscription from Tegea uses it for a temple.[2][3]
  • 5th century BC – Herodotus uses it once; it is otherwise poetic.[7]
  • 5th century BC – Sophocles uses it for a household.[7][6]
  • Septuagint – It is used for a flat roof.[7][10]
  • New Testament – It speaks of proclaiming on the housetops.[10]
  • Modern Greek – It is δώμα, a flat roof or a roof terrace.[11][3]

Meanings

Noun

  1. A house, home, often in the plural for a single house or palace.[7][8]
  2. A room or chamber; the chief room, the hall.[7][8]
  3. The halls of the gods; the house of Hades, the nether world; a temple.[7][8]
  4. A household, family or lineage.[7][8]
  5. (Koine) A flat roof, housetop.[7][10]

Word family

  • δωμάτιον (dōmátion)
  • δωματῖτις (dōmatîtis)
  • δωματόομαι (dōmatóomai)
  • δωματοφθορέω (dōmatophthoréō)
  • δωμάω (dōmáō)

Usage notes

Ammonius distinguishes δῶμα, a house, from its diminutive δωμάτιον (dōmátion), a bedroom.[9]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d 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
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j 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
  4. ^ a b Babiniotis, Georgios (2010), Ετυμολογικό λεξικό της νέας ελληνικής γλώσσας [Etymological Dictionary of Modern Greek], Athens: Κέντρο Λεξικολογίας
  5. ^ a b c Frisk, Hjalmar (1960–1972), Griechisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3 vols, Heidelberg: Carl Winter
  6. ^ a b Rodríguez Adrados, Francisco, et al., eds. (1980–), Diccionario Griego-Español, Madrid: CSIC, http://dge.cchs.csic.es/xdge
  7. ^ 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
  8. ^ a b c d e f g h Diggle, James, et al., eds. (2021), The Cambridge Greek Lexicon, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
  9. ^ a b [Ammonius], De adfinium vocabulorum differentia, ed. K. Nickau (Leipzig: Teubner, 1966)
  10. ^ a b c d 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
  11. ^ a b Ινστιτούτο Νεοελληνικών Σπουδών (Ίδρυμα Μανόλη Τριανταφυλλίδη) (1998), Λεξικό της κοινής νεοελληνικής, Thessaloniki: Aristotle University of Thessaloniki