Etymologically
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καρκίνος

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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)

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