πείθω

Forms

πείθω (peíthō) ^[1] Middle and passive πείθομαι (peíthomai) “obey, believe”, aorist ἐπιθόμην; perfect πέποιθα “trust”, with the newer passive perfect πέπεισμαι.^[2][3][4] The personal name Mycenaean Greek pe-pi-te-me-no-jo perhaps contains a perfect middle participle of the verb.^[3][5]

Etymology

It is inherited from Proto-Hellenic *péitʰō,^[1] from Proto-Indo-European *bʰeydʰ- (“to trust”).^[1][6] Beekes derives the present from a thematic *bʰeidʰ-e/o- and the aorist ἐπιθόμην (epithómēn) from a root aorist with the zero grade *bʰidʰ-; the perfect πέποιθα (pépoitha) continues an old perfect with o-grade.^[2][6] Chantraine holds the middle πείθομαι (peíthomai) “to trust, obey” and its perfect to be the old core, and the active “to persuade” to be secondary; following Benveniste, he sees the original notion as trust and good faith, which is clearest in πιστός (pistós) and πίστις (pístis).^[3]

It is cognate with Latin fīdō (“to trust”), which matches the Greek middle in meaning, and with fidēs, fīdus and foedus (“treaty”), with Albanian bē (“oath”), and with Proto-Germanic *bīdaną, whence Old English bīdan (“to wait”).^[2][1][3] Frisk thought the gap between “trust” and the Germanic “wait” unbridged, while Benveniste, cited by Chantraine, took the Gothic verb to mean first “to wait with trust”.^[7][3]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is found from the first book of the Iliad on, first as the middle ἐπείθετο “he obeyed”, and in Hesiod.^[8][4] In Homer the middle means to obey or to be won over, the active, mostly in the reduplicated aorist πεπιθεῖν, to persuade.^[4][9][2]

Semantic evolution

Classical Greek uses the active for persuading by argument, entreaty or force, and for winning someone over with money; the middle and passive for obeying, complying and believing; and the perfect πέποιθα for trusting and relying on someone.^[3][4][9] Persuasion itself, Πειθώ (Peithṓ), appears as a proper name already in Hesiod.^[5]

In the Septuagint the verb mostly renders Hebrew Biblical Hebrew בטח (bāṭaḥ, “to trust”), and the New Testament uses the active for persuading or trying to persuade and πέποιθα for confidence.^[10][11] Medieval vernacular Greek kept the verb.^[12] Modern Greek has πείθω (peítho) “to persuade” and πείθομαι (peíthomai) as learned words.^[13]

Timeline

• Mycenaean period – The personal name pe-pi-te-me-no-jo perhaps contains a perfect participle of the verb.^[3][5]
• Homer – The Iliad uses the middle for obeying and the active for persuading.^[4][9][8]
• Before the 6th century BC – Hesiod names Πειθώ, Persuasion.^[5]
• 5th century BC – Herodotus and Thucydides use it for winning someone over with money.^[4]
• 5th–4th century BC – Lysias and Isocrates have the new perfect πέπεικα.^[9][2]
• 1st century AD – The New Testament uses it for persuading and πέποιθα for trusting.^[10][11]
• Modern Greek – The learned πείθω (peítho) means “to persuade”.^[13]

Meanings

Verb

1. To persuade, prevail on, urge (someone to do something).^[4][9][10]
2. To win over with money, bribe.^[4]
3. To convince (someone that something is so).^[4][11]
4. (middle and passive) To let oneself be persuaded, comply, obey (someone).^[4][9][2]
5. (middle and passive, Homer) To yield to, resign oneself to (old age, night).^[4]
6. (middle and passive) To be convinced, believe (a person or a story).^[4][10]
7. (perfect πέποιθα) To trust, rely on, be confident.^[9][10][2]

Word family

• πειθώ (peithṓ)
• πεῖσμα (peîsma)
• ἀναπείθω (anapeíthō)
• μεταπείθω (metapeíthō)
• παραπείθω (parapeíthō)
• πειθαρχέω (peitharkhéō)
• εὐπειθής (eupeithḗs)
• πιθανός (pithanós)

Related words

• ἀπειθέω (apeithéō)
• ἀπιθής (apithḗs)
• Πειθώ (Peithṓ)
• πίστις (pístis)
• πιστός (pistós)
• πίσυνος (písunos)
• Latin fīdō
• Latin fidēs
• Latin foedus

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g 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 d e f g 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
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Diggle, James, et al., eds. (2021), The Cambridge Greek Lexicon, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
5. ^ a b c d Babiniotis, Georgios (2010), Ετυμολογικό λεξικό της νέας ελληνικής γλώσσας [Etymological Dictionary of Modern Greek], Athens: Κέντρο Λεξικολογίας
6. ^ a b Rix, Helmut, et al. (2001), Lexikon der indogermanischen Verben, 2nd ed., Wiesbaden: Reichert
7. ^ Frisk, Hjalmar (1960–1972), Griechisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3 vols, Heidelberg: Carl Winter
8. ^ a b Keersmaekers, Alek (2021–2025), GLAUx: The Greek Language Automated corpus, https://github.com/alekkeersmaekers/glaux
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 Abbott-Smith, G. (1922), A Manual Greek Lexicon of the New Testament, Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark
11. ^ 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
12. ^ Kriaras, Emmanuel, Επιτομή του Λεξικού της μεσαιωνικής ελληνικής δημώδους γραμματείας 1100–1669, Κέντρο Ελληνικής Γλώσσας, https://www.greek-language.gr
13. ^ a b Ινστιτούτο Νεοελληνικών Σπουδών (Ίδρυμα Μανόλη Τριανταφυλλίδη) (1998), Λεξικό της κοινής νεοελληνικής, Thessaloniki: Aristotle University of Thessaloniki