πέρκη

Forms

πέρκη (pérkē) f (genitive πέρκης); first declension^[1]

Etymology

It is a noun from an unattested adjective *περκός (*perkós), “spotted, dark”, which is also the base of πέρκος (pérkos, “a hawk”), περκνός (perknós, “spotted, dusky”) and the verb περκάζω (perkázō, “to darken, to ripen”).^[2][3][4] The perch is named for its dusky, spotted colouring.^[5][6] The root is Proto-Indo-European *perḱ- (“variegated, spotted”), which names many animals in the other languages.^[2][3][7]

Cognate with Middle Irish erc (“speckled; salmon, trout”), Old High German forhana (“trout”), Old English forne (“trout”) and Sanskrit पृश्नि (pṛ́śni-, “spotted”).^[2][3][6]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first authors to name the fish, the freshwater perch, are the Sicilian comic poet Epicharmus and Empedocles (5th century BC).^{[8][2][9][10]}

Semantic evolution

In the 5th and 4th centuries BC the perch appears in the lists of fish of the comic poets (Philyllius, Antiphanes) and in Aristotle's zoology, and Athenaeus quotes many of these passages.^[8][9][10] The Hippocratic treatise On Regimen also names it among foods.^[11]

Latin borrowed it as perca, the source, through Old French perche, of English perch (the fish, about 1300).^[12][6][1] The word lives on in Modern Greek as πέρκα (pérka), which also names fish of the genus Serranus.^[13][14]

Timeline

• 5th century BC – Empedocles names the fish, and the comic poet Epicharmus also has it.^[8][2][10]
• 5th–4th century BC – The comic poet Philyllius lists it among fish.^[8][10]
• 4th century BC – Aristotle describes the perch in his History of Animals.^[8][9][10]
• About 1300 – English takes perch from Old French perche, from Latin perca.^[6]
• Modern Greek – The fish is called πέρκα (pérka).^[14][13]

Meanings

Noun

1. The perch, a freshwater fish (Perca fluviatilis).^[8][15][2]

Word family

• περκίς (perkís)
• περκίον (perkíon)

Related words

• περκνός (perknós)
• πέρκος (pérkos)
• περκάζω (perkázō)
• Latin perca
• English perch

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. ^ 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. ^ Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert (1889), An Intermediate Greek-English Lexicon, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b c d Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ Pokorny, Julius (1959), Indogermanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, Bern; Munich: Francke
8. ^ a b c d e f Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert; Jones, Henry Stuart (1940), A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ a b c Bailly, Anatole (2020), Dictionnaire grec-français, Bailly 2020 Hugo Chávez ed., ed. Gérard Gréco et al.
10. ^ a b c d e Rodríguez Adrados, Francisco, et al., eds. (1980–), Diccionario Griego-Español, Madrid: CSIC, http://dge.cchs.csic.es/xdge
11. ^ Keersmaekers, Alek (2021–2025), GLAUx: The Greek Language Automated corpus, https://github.com/alekkeersmaekers/glaux
12. ^ Saalfeld, Günther Alexander (1874), Index Graecorum vocabulorum in linguam latinam translatorum, Berlin: Weidmann
13. ^ a b Πάπυρος–Larousse–Britannica, Μέγα Λεξικό της Ελληνικής Γλώσσας, Athens: Πάπυρος
14. ^ a b Βικιλεξικό, the Greek Wiktionary, https://el.wiktionary.org
15. ^ Diggle, James, et al., eds. (2021), The Cambridge Greek Lexicon, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press