καρκίνος

Pronunciation

• IPA (5th-century BC Attic): /kar.kí.nos/^[1]
• IPA (4th-century AD Koine): /karˈci.nos/^[1]
• IPA (10th-century Byzantine): /karˈci.nos/^[1]

Forms

καρκῐ́νος (karkínos) m (genitive καρκῐ́νου); second declension^[1]

Etymology

It is clearly connected with Latin cancer (“crab”) and Sanskrit कर्कट (karkaṭa, “crab”), but not all the details are clear.^[2][3] Like Latin cancer from *carcros, it may have undergone a dissimilation of the /r/ sounds and then taken the suffix -ινος (-inos).^[2][3][4] The connection with the Sanskrit word is doubted by Mayrhofer and Furnée.^[2]

Beekes regards it as a substrate word, Pre-Greek, from Pre-Greek, like the adjective κάρκαρος (kárkaros) with which Frisk thought it might be connected.^[2][5][1] Furnée compares the Sicilian gloss κάρχαι (kárkhai) “crabs”.^[2][5] Wiktionary allows an Indo-European *karkros, but notes features pointing to a non-Indo-European origin.^[1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Its first recorded uses are in Epicharmus and Hipponax, for the crab.^[2][6][7]

Semantic evolution

Sophocles, Aristophanes, Plato and Xenophon use it for the crab, and Aristotle distinguishes several species.^[6][7] Aristophanes quotes the proverb “you will never make the crab walk straight”.^[6] By metaphor it named a pair of pincers or tongs (Euripides), a malignant tumour, a cancer (Demosthenes), a kind of shoe, and the constellation of the Crab.^[7][2]

Sanskrit कर्किन् (karkin, “Cancer, the zodiac sign”) was borrowed from it.^[2] Modern Greek καρκίνος “crab” continues the ancient word, and καρκίνος “cancer” is a learned word with a Hellenistic sense.^[8]

Timeline

• 6th century BC – Hipponax uses it for the crab.^[7][9]
• 5th century BC – Euripides uses it for tongs.^[7][9]
• 4th century BC – Aristotle distinguishes species of crab.^[6][9]
• 4th century BC – Demosthenes uses it for a tumour.^[7][9]
• Modern Greek – καρκίνος means crab and cancer.^[8]

Meanings

Noun

1. A crab.^[6][7]
2. A pair of pincers, tongs.^[7][1]
3. (medicine) A malignant tumour, cancer.^[7][1]
4. A kind of shoe.^[2]
5. The constellation and zodiac sign Cancer.^[2][1]

Word family

• καρκίνωμα (karkínōma)

Related words

• Latin cancer

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 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
3. ^ a b Frisk, Hjalmar (1960–1972), Griechisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3 vols, Heidelberg: Carl Winter
4. ^ Πάπυρος–Larousse–Britannica, Μέγα Λεξικό της Ελληνικής Γλώσσας, Athens: Πάπυρος
5. ^ a b Beekes, Robert S. P. (2014), Pre-Greek: Phonology, Morphology, Lexicon, ed. Stefan Norbruis, Leiden; Boston: Brill
6. ^ a b c d e 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 g h i Diggle, James, et al., eds. (2021), The Cambridge Greek Lexicon, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
8. ^ a b Ινστιτούτο Νεοελληνικών Σπουδών (Ίδρυμα Μανόλη Τριανταφυλλίδη) (1998), Λεξικό της κοινής νεοελληνικής, Thessaloniki: Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
9. ^ a b c d Rodríguez Adrados, Francisco, et al., eds. (1980–), Diccionario Griego-Español, Madrid: CSIC, http://dge.cchs.csic.es/xdge