σιρός

Pronunciation

• 5th-century BC Attic: /siː.rós/^[1]
• 4th-century AD Koine: /siˈros/^[1]
• 10th-century Byzantine: /siˈros/^[1]

Forms

σῑ̆ρός (sīrós) m (genitive σῑ̆ροῦ); second declension^[1]

Etymology

Beekes considers it Pre-Greek, from Pre-Greek: a technical word without an etymology, whose variation between short and long /i/ and the spelling σειρός (seirós) are hard to explain from Indo-European.^[2][3][4] Solmsen and Persson linked it with σιμός (sīmós, “snub-nosed”), as a “sinking in”, which Beekes and Frisk find improbable.^[2][4] A Semitic origin, from the Hebrew word for a cooking pot, was proposed by Lewy and is rejected by Rosół.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is an Attic inscription from Eleusis of about 440–435 BC, where it is a pit for storing grain.^[6][7]

Semantic evolution

Sophocles and Euripides use it in lost plays, and Demosthenes of the grain pits of Thrace.^[7][8] In later Greek it was also spelt σειρός.^[7] The novelist Longus uses it for a pitfall, and Hesychius glosses it as a jar and as a prison.^[7][9] A variant reading in the Second Letter of Peter speaks of “pits of darkness”.^[10]

It was borrowed into Latin as sirus.^[11]

Timeline

• About 440–435 BC – An inscription from Eleusis uses it for grain pits.^[6][7]
• 5th century BC – Sophocles and Euripides use it in plays now lost.^[7][12]
• 4th century BC – Demosthenes speaks of the grain pits of Thrace.^[7][8][12]
• 1st century BC – Diodorus Siculus writes it σειρός.^[7][12]
• 1st century AD – A London papyrus records it.^[7][10]
• 5th century AD (probably) – Hesychius glosses it as a jar and a prison.^[9][12]

Meanings

Noun

1. An underground pit for storing grain, a silo.^[7][8]
2. A pitfall.^[7]
3. A deep hole or cave; a prison.^[10][9]

Word family

• σιρομάστης (siromástēs)

Related words

• Latin sirus

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ 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
3. ^ Beekes, Robert S. P. (2014), Pre-Greek: Phonology, Morphology, Lexicon, ed. Stefan Norbruis, Leiden; Boston: Brill
4. ^ a b Frisk, Hjalmar (1960–1972), Griechisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3 vols, Heidelberg: Carl Winter
5. ^ Rosół, Rafał (2013), Frühe semitische Lehnwörter im Griechischen, Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang
6. ^ a b Scarborough, Matthew (2025), PHILOGLOSSA: database of Pre-Greek and other non-Indo-European words in Ancient Greek, version 1.0
7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert; Jones, Henry Stuart (1940), A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ a b c Diggle, James, et al., eds. (2021), The Cambridge Greek Lexicon, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
9. ^ a b c Hesychius of Alexandria, Lexicon, ed. Kurt Latte (Α–Ο, Copenhagen 1953–1966) and Moritz Schmidt (Π–Ω, Jena 1858–1868)
10. ^ 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
11. ^ Saalfeld, Günther Alexander (1874), Index Graecorum vocabulorum in linguam latinam translatorum, Berlin: Weidmann
12. ^ a b c d Rodríguez Adrados, Francisco, et al., eds. (1980–), Diccionario Griego-Español, Madrid: CSIC, http://dge.cchs.csic.es/xdge