πέτρα

Forms

πέτρᾱ (pétrā) f (genitive πέτρᾱς); first declension^[1] Ionic and epic πέτρη.^[2][3]

Etymology

The origin is unknown.^[4][5][6] Beekes considers it Pre-Greek, since no explanation works, and notes its suffix -ρ- among the Pre-Greek suffixes.^[6][7] Chantraine finds none of the proposals listed by Frisk satisfactory.^[5]

Older proposals connect it with πίπτω (píptō, “to fall”), as a “fall” of rock, with Latin impetīgō, with taberna through a reversed *τέπρα (*tépra), or with πετάννυμι (petánnumi), but Frisk and Beekes reject them all.^[4][6] Meier-Brügger's derivation from Proto-Indo-European *per-trom (“instrument for getting through”) is semantically unlikely, in Beekes's view.^[1]

It is probably an old collective beside πέτρος (pétros, “stone”).^[5][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Homer uses it, in the Ionic form, for cliffs by the sea, rocky peaks and ridges, caves in the rock and the huge boulder the Cyclops sets in the doorway of his cave.^[2][3][8]

Semantic evolution

In Classical Greek it is mainly “rock, cliff, crag”, as in the crags of the Caucasus in Aeschylus or the twin-peaked rock of Parnassus in Sophocles, while the usual word for a stone one can throw is πέτρος (pétros).^[2][5] The distinction is not strict, and Galen plays it down.^[2] The rock stands for firmness (in the Odyssey a man stands fast like a rock) and for hardness of heart (in Aeschylus someone pitiless is “wrought from rock”).^[2][3]

In the New Testament it is the bedrock on which a house is built, the rocky ground with thin soil in Luke, and the rock that Moses struck, which Paul identifies with Christ.^[9] The name given to the apostle Simon, Πέτρος (Pétros), answers the Aramaic Kephas and is drawn from πέτρα, and in Matthew the rock is the subject of a play on that name.^[5][9]

In later Greek the meaning weakened to “stone”.^[5][6] Triantafyllidis dates this sense, today's meaning of πέτρα (pétra), to the Middle Ages, while Babiniotis calls it Hellenistic.^[10][8] Latin borrowed it as petra, and English petrify comes through French from the Latin word.^[11][12] Coptic borrowed it too.^[13]

Timeline

• Homer – The Iliad and the Odyssey use it for cliffs, peaks, caves and boulders.^[2][3]
• Before the 6th century BC – Hesiod's Theogony describes a cave under a hollow rock.^[2][14]
• 6th–5th century BC – Aeschylus uses it of the crags of the Caucasus and of hard-heartedness.^[2][3][14]
• 3rd century BC – A Zenon papyrus uses it for the bedrock reached in digging.^[2]
• 1st century AD – The Gospel of Matthew plays on the name of Peter and the word for rock.^[9][5]
• 2nd century AD – Galen plays down the difference between it and πέτρος (pétros).^[2][14]
• About AD 600 – A Sahidic Coptic text has the loanword Coptic ⲡⲉⲧⲣⲁ (petra).^[13]
• Modern Greek – The word survives as πέτρα (pétra) “stone”.^[10][8]

Meanings

Noun

1. A rock, cliff or ledge, especially by the sea; a rocky peak or ridge.^[2][3]
2. A hollow rock, a cave.^[2][9]
3. A mass of rock, a boulder.^[2][3]
4. Stone as a building material.^[2] (Hellenistic and later) A stone.^[6][5]
5. (figurative) A symbol of firmness, or of hard-heartedness.^[3][2]
6. (New Testament) Bedrock as a foundation; rocky ground with a thin layer of soil.^[9]

Word family

• πετραῖος (petraîos)
• πετρήεις (petrḗeis)
• πέτρινος (pétrinos)
• πετρώδης (petrṓdēs)
• πέτρωμα (pétrōma)
• ὑπόπετρος (hupópetros)
• πετρόω (petróō)

Related words

• πέτρος (pétros)
• Πέτρος (Pétros)
• Latin petra
• English petrify

Usage notes

Homer has the proverbial phrase “not from an oak nor from a rock”.^[2]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert; Jones, Henry Stuart (1940), A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Diggle, James, et al., eds. (2021), The Cambridge Greek Lexicon, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
4. ^ a b c Frisk, Hjalmar (1960–1972), Griechisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3 vols, Heidelberg: Carl Winter
5. ^ a b c d e f g h 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
6. ^ a b c d e 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
7. ^ Beekes, Robert S. P. (2014), Pre-Greek: Phonology, Morphology, Lexicon, ed. Stefan Norbruis, Leiden; Boston: Brill
8. ^ a b c Babiniotis, Georgios (2010), Ετυμολογικό λεξικό της νέας ελληνικής γλώσσας [Etymological Dictionary of Modern Greek], Athens: Κέντρο Λεξικολογίας
9. ^ a b c d e 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
10. ^ a b Ινστιτούτο Νεοελληνικών Σπουδών (Ίδρυμα Μανόλη Τριανταφυλλίδη) (1998), Λεξικό της κοινής νεοελληνικής, Thessaloniki: Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
11. ^ Saalfeld, Günther Alexander (1874), Index Graecorum vocabulorum in linguam latinam translatorum, Berlin: Weidmann
12. ^ Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
13. ^ a b Database and Dictionary of Greek Loanwords in Coptic (DDGLC), Freie Universität Berlin and Universität Leipzig
14. ^ a b c Rodríguez Adrados, Francisco, et al., eds. (1980–), Diccionario Griego-Español, Madrid: CSIC, http://dge.cchs.csic.es/xdge