κασία

Forms

κᾰσίᾱ (kasíā) f (genitive κᾰσίᾱς); first declension^[1]

Etymology

It is an Oriental loanword,^[2][3] from a Semitic source matching Biblical Hebrew קְצִיעָה (qəṣīʿā, “cassia”) and Akkadian kasîa.^[2][4][1] Wiktionary connects the Hebrew word with קָצַע (qāṣaʿ, “to cut off”), after the way the bark is harvested.^[1] Following Gonda, Kretschmer held that the word was Austro-Asiatic in the first place.^[2]

Latin casia was borrowed from it.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is first found in Sappho, in the 7th or 6th century BC, as a fragrant spice.^[4][6][2]

Semantic evolution

It named cassia, a kind of cinnamon, used as a spice and as incense.^[2][6] Herodotus mentions it twice in his Histories;^[4][7] Melanippides counts it, with frankincense and dates, among the soft seeds of Syria.^[4] It appears in the Hippocratic treatises on women's diseases.^[7] It was sometimes spelt with ⟨σσ⟩.^[4][3] Dioscorides has the verb κασσίζω (kassízō), “to smell or taste of cinnamon”, and Antiphanes an adjective meaning “cinnamon-scented”.^[3][4]

In the Septuagint it is cassia in the Psalms and Ezekiel, and Κασία is the name of one of Job's daughters.^[8] Medieval Greek kept the word.^[9]

Timeline

• 7th–6th century BC – Sappho mentions it.^[4][6]
• 5th century BC – Herodotus mentions it.^[4][7]
• 4th–3rd century BC – Theophrastus mentions it.^[4]
• 3rd century BC – An inscription from Branchidae records it.^[4]
• 3rd–2nd century BC – The Septuagint uses it in the Psalms and Ezekiel, and as a woman's name in Job.^[8]
• 1st century AD – Dioscorides spells it with ⟨σσ⟩.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. Cassia, a kind of cinnamon (Cinnamomum iners), used as a spice and as incense.^[4][6][2]

Related words

• Latin casia

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f 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 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 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
5. ^ Saalfeld, Günther Alexander (1874), Index Graecorum vocabulorum in linguam latinam translatorum, Berlin: Weidmann
6. ^ a b c d Diggle, James, et al., eds. (2021), The Cambridge Greek Lexicon, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
7. ^ a b c Keersmaekers, Alek (2021–2025), GLAUx: The Greek Language Automated corpus, https://github.com/alekkeersmaekers/glaux
8. ^ a b Lust, Johan; Eynikel, Erik; Hauspie, Katrin (2003), Greek-English Lexicon of the Septuagint, rev. ed., Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft
9. ^ Kriaras, Emmanuel, Επιτομή του Λεξικού της μεσαιωνικής ελληνικής δημώδους γραμματείας 1100–1669, Κέντρο Ελληνικής Γλώσσας, https://www.greek-language.gr