Etymologically
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πλατύς

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Pronunciation

  • IPA (5th-century BC Attic): /pla.týs/[1]
  • IPA (4th-century AD Koine): /plaˈtys/[1]
  • IPA (10th-century Byzantine): /plaˈtys/[1]

Forms

πλᾰτῠ́ς (platús) m (feminine πλᾰτεῖᾰ, neuter πλᾰτῠ́); first/third declension[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Proto-Hellenic *plətús, inherited from Proto-Indo-European *pléth₂us, from *pleth₂- (“flat”).[1] It is directly identical with Sanskrit पृथु (pṛthú, “wide, broad”) and Avestan pərəθu- (pərəθu-, “wide”);[2] Lithuanian platùs (“wide”) belongs here too.[3]

The noun πλάτος (plátos, “width”) stands beside it as βάρος (báros) does beside βαρύς (barús).[2] The town name Πλάταια (Plátaia) has been compared with पृथिवी (pṛthivī́, “earth, the broad one”).[2][3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Homer uses it for broad things such as a shoulder-strap (Iliad 5.796) and a winnowing-fan (Iliad 13.588), for wide-ranging herds of goats (Iliad 2.474), and for the broad Hellespont.[4][5]

Semantic evolution

Herodotus and Xenophon use it for flat, level land, and in Plato's Phaedo Socrates asks whether the earth is flat or round.[6][5] Of people it meant broad-shouldered, burly (Sophocles, Theocritus), and figuratively wide in scope.[5] The feminine πλατεῖα (plateîa) used as a noun meant a street or highway (Polybius, the New Testament, Plutarch), and in Aristophanes the flat of the hand.[5]

The word survives in Modern Greek πλατύς “wide” and in Mariupol Greek;[1][7] medieval and Modern Greek πλατεία is a town square.[8][9]

Timeline

  • Homer – The Iliad uses it for broad objects and wide-ranging herds.[4]
  • 5th century BC – Herodotus uses it for flat land.[6][10]
  • 5th–4th century BC – Plato contrasts a flat earth with a round one.[6][10]
  • 2nd century BC – Polybius uses the feminine for a street.[5][10]
  • Modern Greek – πλατύς still means wide.[7]

Meanings

Adjective

  1. Wide, broad.[6][5]
  2. Flat, level.[6][5]
  3. Of a person: broad-shouldered, burly.[6][5]
  4. Extending over a large area, wide-ranging.[5]
  5. (figurative) Wide in scope.[5]

Noun

  1. (feminine) A street, highway; the flat of the hand.[5]

Word family

  • πλάτη (plátē)
  • πλατεῖα (plateîa)

Usage notes

A separate πλατύς “salty” occurs in Herodotus (2.108) and Aristotle;[11] Beekes and Frisk explain it as a misunderstanding of Homer's “broad Hellespont” as the “salty Hellespont”, since “broad” seemed an odd epithet for a strait.[11][2]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d Frisk, Hjalmar (1960–1972), Griechisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3 vols, Heidelberg: Carl Winter
  3. ^ a b Wodtko, Dagmar S.; Irslinger, Britta; Schneider, Carolin (2008), Nomina im indogermanischen Lexikon, Heidelberg: Winter
  4. ^ a b Cunliffe, Richard John (1924), A Lexicon of the Homeric Dialect, London: Blackie and Son
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Diggle, James, et al., eds. (2021), The Cambridge Greek Lexicon, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
  6. ^ a b c d e f Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert; Jones, Henry Stuart (1940), A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ a b Ινστιτούτο Νεοελληνικών Σπουδών (Ίδρυμα Μανόλη Τριανταφυλλίδη) (1998), Λεξικό της κοινής νεοελληνικής, Thessaloniki: Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
  8. ^ Kriaras, Emmanuel, Επιτομή του Λεξικού της μεσαιωνικής ελληνικής δημώδους γραμματείας 1100–1669, Κέντρο Ελληνικής Γλώσσας, https://www.greek-language.gr
  9. ^ Πάπυρος–Larousse–Britannica, Μέγα Λεξικό της Ελληνικής Γλώσσας, Athens: Πάπυρος
  10. ^ a b c Rodríguez Adrados, Francisco, et al., eds. (1980–), Diccionario Griego-Español, Madrid: CSIC, http://dge.cchs.csic.es/xdge
  11. ^ 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