θύμον

Forms

θύμον (thúmon) n (genitive θύμου); second declension^[1]

Etymology

The traditional explanation, given by Frisk and Chantraine after Strömberg, makes it a derivative in -μος (-mos) from Ancient Greek θύω (thúō, “to smoke, to give off a smell”), the plant being named for its scent.^[2][3][1] Beekes doubts this: a variant of θυμός (thūmós) with a short /u/ is impossible in Indo-European terms, and as the name of a local plant the word may well be Pre-Greek.^[4][5] He compares the fish name θύμαλλος (thúmallos).^[4] Frisk compares θύμβρα (thúmbra, “savory”).^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is first found in the 5th century BC, in the comic poets Eupolis, Pherecrates and Aristophanes, of an aromatic shrub.^[6][7]

Semantic evolution

The plant was not our garden thyme, which Chantraine thought did not grow in Greece, but a kind of savory, identified by LSJ as Cretan thyme, Thymbra capitata.^[3][6] In Aristophanes it is food of the poor, and LSJ explains it there as a mixture of thyme with honey and vinegar eaten by the poor of Attica.^[6][7] Theophrastus' flatterer swears that no perfume smells sweeter than thyme, and Theophrastus also uses the name for a marine plant.^[6] The CGL also gives a variety of garlic, and Hesychius glosses the word with σκόροδον (skórodon, “garlic”).^[7][8]

A masculine θύμος (thúmos), used by Dioscorides for the plant, served the physicians for a fleshy growth and for the thymus gland, a sense that Chantraine derives from the plant name.^[6][3] Latin borrowed the word as Latin thymum.^[9] In Modern Greek the plant is θυμάρι (thymári), from a Medieval diminutive in -άριον (-árion) of the Hellenistic θύμος.^[10][11]

Timeline

• 5th century BC – Eupolis, Pherecrates and Aristophanes name the plant, and Aristophanes makes it the food of the poor.^[6][7][12]
• 4th century BC – Aristotle writes about thyme and bees.^[6][13]
• 4th–3rd century BC – Theophrastus uses it in his Characters and in his botany, also for a marine plant.^[6]
• 1st century AD – Dioscorides uses the masculine θύμος for the plant.^[6][3]
• Modern Greek – The plant is called θυμάρι (thymári), a diminutive formed from θύμος.^[10]

Meanings

Noun

1. An aromatic shrub, Cretan thyme or savory.^[6][7][3]
2. A marine plant.^[6]
3. A dish of thyme with honey and vinegar, eaten by the poor of Attica.^[6]
4. A variety of garlic.^[7][8]

Related words

• θύμβρα (thúmbra)
• Latin thymum

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b Frisk, Hjalmar (1960–1972), Griechisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3 vols, Heidelberg: Carl Winter
3. ^ a b c d e 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 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
5. ^ Bailly, Anatole (2020), Dictionnaire grec-français, Bailly 2020 Hugo Chávez ed., ed. Gérard Gréco et al.
6. ^ 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
7. ^ a b c d e f Diggle, James, et al., eds. (2021), The Cambridge Greek Lexicon, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
8. ^ a b Hesychius of Alexandria, Lexicon, ed. Kurt Latte (Α–Ο, Copenhagen 1953–1966) and Moritz Schmidt (Π–Ω, Jena 1858–1868)
9. ^ Saalfeld, Günther Alexander (1874), Index Graecorum vocabulorum in linguam latinam translatorum, Berlin: Weidmann
10. ^ a b Ινστιτούτο Νεοελληνικών Σπουδών (Ίδρυμα Μανόλη Τριανταφυλλίδη) (1998), Λεξικό της κοινής νεοελληνικής, Thessaloniki: Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
11. ^ Babiniotis, Georgios (2010), Ετυμολογικό λεξικό της νέας ελληνικής γλώσσας [Etymological Dictionary of Modern Greek], Athens: Κέντρο Λεξικολογίας
12. ^ Rodríguez Adrados, Francisco, et al., eds. (1980–), Diccionario Griego-Español, Madrid: CSIC, http://dge.cchs.csic.es/xdge
13. ^ Keersmaekers, Alek (2021–2025), GLAUx: The Greek Language Automated corpus, https://github.com/alekkeersmaekers/glaux