πόσος

Forms

πόσος (pósos), feminine πόση, neuter πόσον.^[1] Ionic (Herodotus) κόσος.^[2][1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Proto-Indo-European *kʷóti (“how many”), made into an adjective in Greek, with /ti̯/ becoming /s/.^[2][3] The Indo-European adverb survives in Sanskrit कति (káti) and Latin quot “how many?”.^[2][3] It belongs with the interrogatives πόθεν (póthen) and with the demonstrative τόσος (tósos) “so great”.^[2][3]

Earliest recorded meaning

Its earliest use in the GLAUx corpus is in Aeschylus' Persians, in a question about how great the number of ships was.^[4][1]

Semantic evolution

It asks about quantity of every kind: number (“how many?”), size (“how great?”), distance (“how far?”), time (“how long?”) and value (“how much?”, the genitive πόσου “at what price?”).^[1] Aristotle made the indefinite ποσός (posós) a philosophical term, and his abstract ποσότης (posótēs) means “quantity”.^[2][3]

Medieval Greek kept the word, and it is still Modern Greek πόσος (pósos).^[5][6][7]

Timeline

• 6th–5th century BC – Aeschylus uses it in the Persians of the number of ships.^[1][4]
• 5th century BC – Herodotus uses the Ionic form κόσος.^[1][2]
• 5th century BC – Sophocles uses it of a length of time.^[1][8]
• 5th–4th century BC – Aristophanes and Xenophon use it of price and distance.^[1][8]
• Modern Greek – πόσος (pósos) continues the ancient word.^[6][7]

Meanings

Pronoun

1. (interrogative) Of number, how many?^[1]
2. Of size or amount, how great? how much?^[1][2]
3. Of distance, how far?^[1]
4. Of time, how long?^[1]
5. Of value, how much? πόσου “at what price?”.^[1]

Word family

• ποσότης (posótēs)
• ποσάκις (posákis)
• πόστος (póstos)
• ποσός (posós)

Related words

• τόσος (tósos)
• πόθεν (póthen)
• Latin quot

References

1. ^ 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
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 Frisk, Hjalmar (1960–1972), Griechisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3 vols, Heidelberg: Carl Winter
4. ^ a b Keersmaekers, Alek (2021–2025), GLAUx: The Greek Language Automated corpus, https://github.com/alekkeersmaekers/glaux
5. ^ Kriaras, Emmanuel, Επιτομή του Λεξικού της μεσαιωνικής ελληνικής δημώδους γραμματείας 1100–1669, Κέντρο Ελληνικής Γλώσσας, https://www.greek-language.gr
6. ^ a b Ινστιτούτο Νεοελληνικών Σπουδών (Ίδρυμα Μανόλη Τριανταφυλλίδη) (1998), Λεξικό της κοινής νεοελληνικής, Thessaloniki: Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
7. ^ a b Ακαδημία Αθηνών (2014), Χρηστικό Λεξικό της Νεοελληνικής Γλώσσας, Athens: Academy of Athens
8. ^ a b Rodríguez Adrados, Francisco, et al., eds. (1980–), Diccionario Griego-Español, Madrid: CSIC, http://dge.cchs.csic.es/xdge