Etymologically
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πύξ

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Pronunciation

  • 5th-century BC Attic: /pýks/[1]
  • 4th-century AD Koine: /ˈpyks/[1]
  • 10th-century Byzantine: /ˈpyks/[1]

Forms

πύξ (púx) [1] Hesychius also records πύξ as a noun, glossing it “fist”.[2][3]

Etymology

It is an old adverb meaning “with the fist”, built on the same element as underlies πυγμή (pugmḗ, “fist; boxing”), πυγών (pugṓn, “a measure of length”) and πύκτης (púktēs, “boxer”).[4][3] Beekes thinks a nominal origin most likely for πύξ;[4] Chantraine reports that its final -ξ has been explained as an adverbial -s, as a nominative and as a dative plural.[3] Wiktionary traces it to Proto-Indo-European *pewǵ- (“to punch”).[1]

The only clear cognates are Latin: Latin pugil (“boxer”) and pugnus (“fist”), from which come pugnō (“to fight”) and pugna (“battle”).[3][4] Fick, Walde and others connect the group further with pungō (“to prick, sting”), the clenched fist being named as the thing that stings or wounds.[4][3][5] Words for the fist differ from language to language, and even within Greek, which also has γρόνθος (grónthos).[3]

Ancient grammarians derived πύξ from πτύσσω (ptússō, “to fold”) by dropping letters, because the fingers are folded when one strikes.[6][7] Philoxenus (1st century BC) and the Etymologicum Magnum give this explanation.[6][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is first found in Homer, always of boxing: in the Iliad Polydeuces is πὺξ ἀγαθός, “good with the fist”, that is, a fine boxer (3.237), and in book 23 it means to box or at boxing (23.621, 634, 660).[8][9]

Semantic evolution

In the choral lyric of Pindar and Simonides it is the word for winning or excelling at boxing in the games.[9][10] In Attic comedy and prose it means striking or being struck with the fist: Aristophanes, Xenophon and Lysias use it so, and the Hippocratic Diseases speaks of holding the fingers clenched in a fist.[9][10] Theocritus has a man punched on the temple.[9]

The phrase πὺξ λάξ, “with fist and heel”, joins it to λάξ (láx).[11] Modern Greek keeps πύξ only in that frozen phrase, while its relative πυγμή (pugmḗ) survives as a learned word.[6]

Timeline

  • Homer – The Iliad and the Odyssey use it of boxing, and of Polydeuces as a boxer.[8][9]
  • Before the 6th century BC – The Hesiodic Shield describes fighters who fought “with fists and by dragging”.[9][12]
  • 6th–5th century BC – Pindar praises an athlete who won excellence at boxing.[9][12]
  • 5th century BC – A Hippocratic treatise uses it of fingers clenched in a fist.[9][12]
  • 5th–4th century BC – Aristophanes, Xenophon and Lysias use it of hitting someone with the fist.[9][10][12]
  • 1st century BC – Philoxenus derives it from πτύσσω “to fold”.[6]
  • Modern Greek – It survives only in the fixed phrase “with fist and heel”.[6][11]

Meanings

Adverb

  1. With the fist, of striking someone or being struck.[10][9]
  2. In or at boxing, of contending, excelling or winning.[10][9][8]
  • πυγμή (pugmḗ)
  • πύκτης (púktēs)
  • πυγμαῖος (pugmaîos)
  • πύγμαχος (púgmakhos)
  • Latin pugnus
  • Latin pugil

Usage notes

LSJ and Pape also record a late feminine noun πύξ (genitive πυγός), a later form of πυγή (pūgḗ, “buttocks”), which has nothing to do with the adverb.[9][13]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ Hesychius of Alexandria, Lexicon, ed. Kurt Latte (Α–Ο, Copenhagen 1953–1966) and Moritz Schmidt (Π–Ω, Jena 1858–1868)
  3. ^ a b c d e f 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 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
  5. ^ Pokorny, Julius (1959), Indogermanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, Bern; Munich: Francke
  6. ^ a b c d e Etygram: ancient etymologies of Greek words, CEPAM, Université Côte d'Azur, http://appsweb-cepam.unice.fr/etygram
  7. ^ a b Gaisford, Thomas, ed. (1848), Etymologicum Magnum, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  8. ^ a b c Cunliffe, Richard John (1924), A Lexicon of the Homeric Dialect, London: Blackie and Son
  9. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert; Jones, Henry Stuart (1940), A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  10. ^ a b c d e Diggle, James, et al., eds. (2021), The Cambridge Greek Lexicon, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
  11. ^ a b Korinthios, J. (2025), Grande Dizionario Greco Classico: Greco–Italiano, digital ed., Milan: Hoepli
  12. ^ a b c d Rodríguez Adrados, Francisco, et al., eds. (1980–), Diccionario Griego-Español, Madrid: CSIC, http://dge.cchs.csic.es/xdge
  13. ^ Pape, Wilhelm (1914), Griechisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 3rd ed., rev. Max Sengebusch, Braunschweig: Vieweg