Etymologically
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οἶνος

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Pronunciation

  • 5th-century BC Attic: /ôi̯.nos/[1]
  • 4th-century AD Koine: /ˈy.nos/[1]
  • 10th-century Byzantine: /ˈy.nos/[1]

Forms

οἶνος (oînos) m (genitive οἴνου); second declension[1] Mycenaean Greek wo-no.[2] Aeolic and Cypriot ϝοῖνος (Cypriot genitive wo-i-no).[2][3][4]

Etymology

It is inherited from Proto-Hellenic *wóinos,[1] as Mycenaean Greek wo-no and dialect forms written with ⟨ϝ⟩ show.[1][3] It belongs with other words for wine in southern Europe: Latin vīnum, Old Armenian գինի (gini) and Gheg vênë.[4][1] Beekes reconstructs an Indo-European word for wine from them and, with ἴτυς (ítus) “willow” and vītis (“vine”), derives it from the root Proto-Indo-European *ueh₁-i- (“to turn, bend”);[4] Wiktionary also relates dialectal ὑιήν (huiḗn) “vine”.[4][1]

Since vines were first cultivated around the Mediterranean, the Black Sea and the southern Caucasus, most scholars look for a non-Indo-European source there;[4] Beekes allows that if viticulture began around the Black Sea and the northern Balkans, the word could have spread from there into Greek, Latin, Armenian and Albanian, and also into Hittite u̯ii̯an(a)- and the Semitic words for wine.[4] Rosół lists it among Oriental loanwords of unknown origin, a Semitic source being doubtful.[3] The Celtic and Germanic words were borrowed from Latin.[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Mycenaean tablets from Pylos record Mycenaean Greek wo-no “wine”, and Knossos has Mycenaean Greek wo-na-si “in the vineyards”.[2] Homer gives wine many epithets (dark, red, sparkling, sweet, honey-sweet, old) and mixes it with water in the bowl: οἶνον ἔμισγον ἐνὶ κρητῆρσι καὶ ὕδωρ, “they mixed wine and water in the mixing bowls”.[5][6]

Semantic evolution

Wine was poured for the gods and the dead, served at feasts, used as a remedy and blamed for drunkenness; it was linked with Dionysus and with love.[6] The lyric poets and Plato made it proverbial as what brings the truth out, and ἐν οἴνῳ or ἐν τοῖς οἴνοις meant “at a drinking party”.[6][5][7] Herodotus extended it to drinks made from barley, lotus or palms, and the plural meant kinds of wine.[6]

In the New Testament it is the wine of the wedding at Cana and the new wine of the parables.[8] In Modern Greek the everyday word is Modern Greek κρασί (krasí); Modern Greek οίνος (ínos) is learned, used in the Church for the wine of the Eucharist.[9] English oeno- comes from it.[10]

Timeline

  • Mycenaean – Tablets from Pylos record Mycenaean Greek wo-no.[2]
  • Homer – The Iliad has wine poured at a sacrifice, the Odyssey wine mixed with water.[5][11]
  • Before the 6th century BC – Hesiod has it, and οἴνη (oínē) for the vine.[11][4][12]
  • 5th century BC – Herodotus uses it for wine made from barley or palms.[6][12]
  • 5th–4th century BC – Plato uses the plural for drinking parties.[5][12]
  • 1st century AD – The Gospel of John tells of the wine at Cana.[8]
  • Modern Greek – Modern Greek οίνος (ínos) survives as a learned and church word beside Modern Greek κρασί (krasí).[9]

Meanings

Noun

  1. Wine made from grapes; in the plural, kinds of wine.[5][6][8]
  2. The juice of the grape, in the ripening fruit or the wine-press.[6]
  3. ἐν οἴνῳ, παρ’ οἴνῳ: over one's cups, at a drinking party.[5][6]
  4. Wine made from other fruit or grain: from barley (beer), lotus, palms.[6]

Word family

  • οἶνοψ (oînops)
  • οἴνη (oínē)
  • οἰνάριον (oinárion)
  • οἰνοχόος (oinokhóos)
  • οἰνάς (oinás)

Usage notes

Photius records two proverbs, “wine and truth” and “wine and children are truthful”, said of people who speak plainly and tell the truth.[7]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d Микенско-русский словарь (Mycenaean–Russian dictionary)
  3. ^ a b c Rosół, Rafał (2013), Frühe semitische Lehnwörter im Griechischen, Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h 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. ^ a b c d e f Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert; Jones, Henry Stuart (1940), A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h i Diggle, James, et al., eds. (2021), The Cambridge Greek Lexicon, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
  7. ^ a b Photius, Lexicon, ed. Christos Theodoridis, vol. 1 (Α–Δ) (Berlin: De Gruyter, 1982); ed. Richard Porson (Cambridge, 1822)
  8. ^ a b c 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
  9. ^ a b Ινστιτούτο Νεοελληνικών Σπουδών (Ίδρυμα Μανόλη Τριανταφυλλίδη) (1998), Λεξικό της κοινής νεοελληνικής, Thessaloniki: Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
  10. ^ Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  11. ^ a b Keersmaekers, Alek (2021–2025), GLAUx: The Greek Language Automated corpus, https://github.com/alekkeersmaekers/glaux
  12. ^ a b c Rodríguez Adrados, Francisco, et al., eds. (1980–), Diccionario Griego-Español, Madrid: CSIC, http://dge.cchs.csic.es/xdge