πάπυρος

Forms

πᾰ́πῡρος (pápūros) m or f (genitive πᾰπῡ́ρου); second declension^[1]

Etymology

A loanword of unknown origin.^[2][3][4] The plant came from Egypt, and the usual guess is an Egyptian source, a phrase meaning "that of the king" (as if papyrus were a royal monopoly), but no such Egyptian word is attested.^[5][6][1] Frisk calls the proposals of Lagarde and others quite doubtful, and Chantraine knows no plausible etymology.^[3][7] Beekes notes that a suffix -ῡρ- is also found in Pre-Greek words.^[2]

The older Greek name of the plant was βύβλος (búblos).^[3][8]

Earliest recorded meaning

Its first record is in Theophrastus' Enquiry into Plants (4.8.2), as the name of the Egyptian papyrus plant, Cyperus papyrus.^[9][10][4]

Semantic evolution

From the plant the word passed to what was made from it: cord and linen, and the writing material, and so a sheet, roll or book.^[4][10][11] Hellenistic papyri also mention papyrus as food (2nd century BC).^[9] The Septuagint uses it three times, of the plant (Isaiah 19:6, Job 8:11, 40:21).^[12]

It was borrowed as Latin papyrus,^[13][4] the source of French papier and English paper.^[4][5][8] Coptic also borrowed the Greek word.^[14]

In Modern Greek πάπυρος (pápyros) is a learned word for the plant and the ancient writing material, and, after French papyrus, for an ancient text written on it.^[15]

Timeline

• 4th–3rd century BC – Theophrastus describes the papyrus plant.^[9][16]
• 2nd century BC – Papyri from Egypt mention papyrus as food.^[9]
• 1st century BC to 1st century AD – Philo and Strabo use the word.^[17][16]
• 1st century AD – Dioscorides describes the plant in his Materia Medica.^[9][16]
• AD 825 – The earliest dated Coptic manuscript with the borrowed word.^[14]
• Modern Greek – πάπυρος (pápyros) is used as a learned word for the plant, the writing material and an ancient papyrus text.^[15]

Meanings

Noun

1. The papyrus plant, Cyperus papyrus.^[9][10]
2. Something made of papyrus: cord, linen.^[9][10][11]
3. Papyrus as writing material; paper, a book.^[10][11][4]

Word family

• παπύρινος (papū́rinos)

Related words

• βύβλος (búblos)
• Latin papyrus
• English paper
• English papyrus

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b 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 Cancik, Hubert; Schneider, Helmuth, eds. (2002–2010), Brill's New Pauly: Encyclopaedia of the Ancient World, Leiden: Brill
6. ^ Πάπυρος–Larousse–Britannica, Μέγα Λεξικό της Ελληνικής Γλώσσας, Athens: Πάπυρος
7. ^ Charbonnet, André (2025), Chæréphon, v4.7: supplement to Bailly from papyri, inscriptions and recent lexica
8. ^ a b Babiniotis, Georgios (2010), Ετυμολογικό λεξικό της νέας ελληνικής γλώσσας [Etymological Dictionary of Modern Greek], Athens: Κέντρο Λεξικολογίας
9. ^ a b c d e f g Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert; Jones, Henry Stuart (1940), A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
10. ^ a b c d e Bailly, Anatole (2020), Dictionnaire grec-français, Bailly 2020 Hugo Chávez ed., ed. Gérard Gréco et al.
11. ^ a b c Pape, Wilhelm (1914), Griechisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 3rd ed., rev. Max Sengebusch, Braunschweig: Vieweg
12. ^ Lust, Johan; Eynikel, Erik; Hauspie, Katrin (2003), Greek-English Lexicon of the Septuagint, rev. ed., Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft
13. ^ Saalfeld, Günther Alexander (1874), Index Graecorum vocabulorum in linguam latinam translatorum, Berlin: Weidmann
14. ^ a b Database and Dictionary of Greek Loanwords in Coptic (DDGLC), Freie Universität Berlin and Universität Leipzig
15. ^ a b Ινστιτούτο Νεοελληνικών Σπουδών (Ίδρυμα Μανόλη Τριανταφυλλίδη) (1998), Λεξικό της κοινής νεοελληνικής, Thessaloniki: Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
16. ^ a b c Rodríguez Adrados, Francisco, et al., eds. (1980–), Diccionario Griego-Español, Madrid: CSIC, http://dge.cchs.csic.es/xdge
17. ^ Keersmaekers, Alek (2021–2025), GLAUx: The Greek Language Automated corpus, https://github.com/alekkeersmaekers/glaux