μέτωπον

Forms

μέτωπον (métōpon) n (genitive μετώπου); second declension^[1]

Etymology

It is a Greek formation from Ancient Greek μετά (metá, “between”) + ὤψ (ṓps, “eye, face”), with a thematic vowel added: properly “the space between the eyes”.^[2][3][1] Aristotle already explains the word in this way in his History of Animals.^[2][4][5] Beekes and Frisk call it a hypostasis, a noun made from the phrase “between the eyes”, and note that the name fits an animal's head best, where the eyes sit on the sides.^[2][3] The parallel form μετώπιον (metṓpion) may be the same formation with the suffix ⟨-ιο-⟩.^[2][3]

The Etymologicum Magnum took the prefix for a stand-in for ὑπέρ (hupér), as if the brow were the part “above the eyes”.^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is found from Homer on, meaning the forehead or brow of a man, and once the white-marked forehead of a horse; the Iliad also uses it for the front of a helmet.^[7][5][8]

Semantic evolution

From the brow the word came to mean the front or face of anything: Pindar speaks of the brow of a land, meaning Mount Etna, and Herodotus and later inscriptions use it for the face of a wall or building.^[5][8][4] From Aeschylus on it is the front of an army or fleet, and in Xenophon, Polybius and Plutarch the line of battle, as opposed to a column, and Xenophon's Cyropaedia contrasts the length of the front with the depth of the formation.^[5][8][9] Galen uses it for the margin of a book, and Dioscorides for a plant that gives galbanum.^[5][4]

In the Septuagint and the New Testament it is the forehead, notably as the place where the servants of God or of the beast are marked in the Book of Revelation.^[10][11][12] Medieval Greek kept it, and Modern Greek has μέτωπο (métopo) for the forehead and the front of a building; the senses “front line” and “political front” were renewed on French front.^[13][14]

Timeline

• Homer – The Iliad uses it for the forehead of men and of a horse, and for the front of a helmet.^[7][15]
• 6th–5th century BC – Aeschylus uses it for the front of an army.^[5][8][16]
• 5th century BC – Herodotus uses it for the face of a wall or building.^[5][16]
• 5th–4th century BC – Xenophon uses ἐν μετώπῳ and εἰς μέτωπον for drawing troops up in line.^[5][8][16]
• 4th century BC – Aristotle explains it as the space between the eyes.^[5][4][16]
• 1st century AD – Dioscorides gives it as the name of the plant that yields galbanum.^[2][4][16]
• 1st century AD – The Book of Revelation speaks of a seal or mark on the forehead.^[11][16]
• Modern Greek – It lives on as μέτωπο (métopo), with the military and political senses of French front.^[14][9]

Meanings

Noun

1. The space between the eyes; the forehead, brow, of people and animals.^[5][8][7]
2. (figurative) The brow of a land, of a mountain.^[8]
3. The front of a helmet.^[8][7]
4. The front or face of a wall, building or city.^[5][8]
5. The front of an army or fleet; the line of battle, as opposed to a column.^[5][8]
6. The margin of a book.^[5]
7. A plant yielding galbanum, the same as χαλβάνη (khalbánē).^[2][4]

Word family

• μετώπιον (metṓpion)
• εὐρυμέτωπος (eurumétōpos)
• μετωπηδόν (metōpēdón)
• μετωπίδιος (metōpídios)

Related words

• ὤψ (ṓps)
• πρόσωπον (prósōpon)

References

1. ^ a b c d e 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 Frisk, Hjalmar (1960–1972), Griechisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3 vols, Heidelberg: Carl Winter
4. ^ a b c d e f 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
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert; Jones, Henry Stuart (1940), A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ Gaisford, Thomas, ed. (1848), Etymologicum Magnum, Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ a b c d Cunliffe, Richard John (1924), A Lexicon of the Homeric Dialect, London: Blackie and Son
8. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Diggle, James, et al., eds. (2021), The Cambridge Greek Lexicon, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
9. ^ a b Babiniotis, Georgios (2010), Ετυμολογικό λεξικό της νέας ελληνικής γλώσσας [Etymological Dictionary of Modern Greek], Athens: Κέντρο Λεξικολογίας
10. ^ Lust, Johan; Eynikel, Erik; Hauspie, Katrin (2003), Greek-English Lexicon of the Septuagint, rev. ed., Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft
11. ^ a b 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
12. ^ United Bible Societies (2023), UBS Dictionary of the Greek New Testament (revised Louw–Nida semantic domains), open-licence ed.
13. ^ Kriaras, Emmanuel, Επιτομή του Λεξικού της μεσαιωνικής ελληνικής δημώδους γραμματείας 1100–1669, Κέντρο Ελληνικής Γλώσσας, https://www.greek-language.gr
14. ^ a b Ινστιτούτο Νεοελληνικών Σπουδών (Ίδρυμα Μανόλη Τριανταφυλλίδη) (1998), Λεξικό της κοινής νεοελληνικής, Thessaloniki: Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
15. ^ Keersmaekers, Alek (2021–2025), GLAUx: The Greek Language Automated corpus, https://github.com/alekkeersmaekers/glaux
16. ^ a b c d e f Rodríguez Adrados, Francisco, et al., eds. (1980–), Diccionario Griego-Español, Madrid: CSIC, http://dge.cchs.csic.es/xdge