πλέω
Pronunciation
- 5th-century BC Attic: /plé.ɔː/[1]
- 4th-century AD Koine: /ˈple.o/[1]
- 10th-century Byzantine: /ˈple.o/[1]
Forms
πλέω (pléō) [1] Epic πλείω, Epic and Ionic πλώω, future πλεύσομαι, later πλευσοῦμαι and πλεύσω, aorist ἔπλευσα, perfect πέπλευκα.[2][3] Homer uses only the present, imperfect and future.[2][3]
Etymology
It is inherited from Proto-Hellenic *pléwō,[1] inherited from Proto-Indo-European *plew- (“to sail, flow, swim”), a primary thematic present of a root that LIV glosses “to swim, float”.[4][1][5] The ⟨ϝ⟩ was lost between vowels, but before a consonant it remains as the ⟨υ⟩ of a diphthong, as in the future stem ⟨πλευσ-⟩.[1]
Cognate with Latin pluit (“it rains”) and English float.[4][1] The derivative πλοῖον (ploîon, “ship”) matches Old Norse fley (“ship”), and πλόος (plóos, “voyage”) matches Tocharian B plewe (“ship”).[4] πλύνω (plúnō, “to wash”) belongs to the same root.[4][6]
Earliest recorded meaning
In Homer it means to sail, of men and of ships; the Ionic πλώω is used of armour and corpses floating in a river.[2][3]
Semantic evolution
Herodotus uses it of a floating island and Thucydides of goods carried by sea.[2][3] Sophocles and Demosthenes speak of the city as a ship that sails upright, on an even keel.[2][3] It was very often used with prefixes, and it gave the nouns πλόος (plóos) and πλοῖον (ploîon).[4] In the New Testament it is the ordinary verb for travelling by sea, as in Luke and Acts.[7]
Medieval vernacular Greek had a form πλέγω with an aorist έπλεξα, which some dialects keep.[8] Modern Greek πλέω (pléo) is a learned continuation of the ancient verb.[9][6]
Timeline
- Homer – The Iliad and the Odyssey use it for sailing and, in the Ionic form, for floating.[2][3]
- 5th century BC – Herodotus uses it of a floating island.[2][3]
- 5th century BC – Sophocles uses it of the state as a ship on an even keel.[2][3]
- 5th century BC – Thucydides uses it of goods carried by sea.[2][3]
- 1st century AD – Luke and Acts use it for travelling by sea.[7]
- Medieval Greek – The vernacular has the form πλέγω.[8]
- Modern Greek – Modern Greek πλέω (pléo) continues it as a learned word.[9]
Meanings
Verb
- To sail, travel by sea (of people and ships).[2][3][7]
- To sail over (a sea); to make (a voyage).[3]
- (of goods) To be carried by sea.[2][3]
- To float, swim.[2][3]
- (figurative, of a city as a ship) To sail upright, on an even keel.[2][3]
Word family
- ἄπλοια (áploia)
- πλοῖον (ploîon)
- πλόος (plóos)
- πλωτήρ (plōtḗr)
- πλωτικός (plōtikós)
- πλωτός (plōtós)
- πλώω (plṓō)
- ἀναπλέω (anapléō)
- ἀποπλέω (apopléō)
- διαπλέω (diapléō)
- εἰσπλέω (eispléō)
Related words
- πλύνω (plū́nō)
- English float
References
- ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert; Jones, Henry Stuart (1940), A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Diggle, James, et al., eds. (2021), The Cambridge Greek Lexicon, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
- ^ 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
- ^ Rix, Helmut, et al. (2001), Lexikon der indogermanischen Verben, 2nd ed., Wiesbaden: Reichert
- ^ a b Babiniotis, Georgios (2010), Ετυμολογικό λεξικό της νέας ελληνικής γλώσσας [Etymological Dictionary of Modern Greek], Athens: Κέντρο Λεξικολογίας
- ^ 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
- ^ a b Kriaras, Emmanuel, Επιτομή του Λεξικού της μεσαιωνικής ελληνικής δημώδους γραμματείας 1100–1669, Κέντρο Ελληνικής Γλώσσας, https://www.greek-language.gr
- ^ a b Ινστιτούτο Νεοελληνικών Σπουδών (Ίδρυμα Μανόλη Τριανταφυλλίδη) (1998), Λεξικό της κοινής νεοελληνικής, Thessaloniki: Aristotle University of Thessaloniki