ταῦρος

Forms

ταῦρος (taûros) m (genitive ταύρου); second declension^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Proto-Hellenic *táuros,^[1] inherited from Proto-Indo-European *táwros.^[1][2] It matches Latin taurus, Umbrian turuf (accusative plural), Lithuanian taũras (“aurochs”), Old Prussian tauris (“bison”) and Albanian ter;^[2][1] Celtic Old Irish tarb (“bull”) has the consonants in another order.^[2][1] Chantraine calls it a stock-breeding term that marks the sex of the animal, with a vowel a that may be popular.^[3] Germanic words with initial st-, such as Old English stēor (“steer”), are probably not cognate according to Beekes, though Wiktionary includes them.^[2][1]

Very similar words are found in Semitic: Akkadian šūru, Aramaic תּוֹר (tōr), Arabic ثَوْر (ṯawr), from Proto-Semitic *ṯawr-.^[2][1] If the likeness is not chance, there was a borrowing from Indo-European into Semitic, the other way round, or from a common third source;^[2] Rosół lists it among the words shared by Semitic and Indo-European, without a clear direction.^[2][4][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is found from Homer on, for a bull, often as a sacrifice to Poseidon; the Iliad also has ταῦρος βοῦς, “a bull ox”.^[5][6]

Semantic evolution

Myth gave the bull a large place: it was the form of river gods and of Dionysus, Pindar names the bronze bull of Phalaris, and Euripides uses it of the Minotaur.^[7] From the 4th century BC it was the zodiac sign, Taurus.^[5] The grammarians and Hesychius record obscene and anatomical uses, and Pollux names a kind of Lycian boat with a bull's head.^[5][3] The New Testament uses it of sacrificial bulls.^[8]

Modern Greek ταύρος (távros) is a learned continuation of it.^[9]

Timeline

• Homer – The Iliad and the Odyssey use it for bulls, often as sacrifices.^[5][6]
• 6th–5th century BC – Pindar names the bronze bull of Phalaris.^[7][10]
• 4th century BC – Eudoxus uses it for the sign of the zodiac.^[5][10]
• 1st century AD – The New Testament uses it for sacrificial bulls.^[8]
• Modern Greek – Modern Greek ταύρος (távros) means bull (learned).^[9]

Meanings

Noun

1. A bull.^[5][7]
2. The zodiac sign Taurus.^[5]
3. A Lycian boat with a bull as figurehead.^[5]
4. A priest of Poseidon Taureios.^[5]

Word family

• ταυροφάγος (taurophágos)
• ταυρομαχία (tauromakhíā)

Related words

• Latin taurus

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
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 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. ^ Rosół, Rafał (2013), Frühe semitische Lehnwörter im Griechischen, Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert; Jones, Henry Stuart (1940), A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b Keersmaekers, Alek (2021–2025), GLAUx: The Greek Language Automated corpus, https://github.com/alekkeersmaekers/glaux
7. ^ a b c Diggle, James, et al., eds. (2021), The Cambridge Greek Lexicon, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
8. ^ a b 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
9. ^ a b Ινστιτούτο Νεοελληνικών Σπουδών (Ίδρυμα Μανόλη Τριανταφυλλίδη) (1998), Λεξικό της κοινής νεοελληνικής, Thessaloniki: Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
10. ^ a b Rodríguez Adrados, Francisco, et al., eds. (1980–), Diccionario Griego-Español, Madrid: CSIC, http://dge.cchs.csic.es/xdge