χάος

Pronunciation

• IPA (5th-century BC Attic): /kʰá.os/^[1]
• IPA (4th-century AD Koine): /ˈxa.os/^[1]
• IPA (10th-century Byzantine): /ˈxa.os/^[1]

Forms

χᾰ́ος (kháos) n (genitive χᾰ́εος or χᾰ́ους); third declension^[1]

Etymology

It is probably from ⟨*χάϝος⟩, beside χαῦνος (khaûnos, “loose, porous”), in the same relation as ἔρεβος (érebos) to ἐρεμνός (eremnós).^[2][3][1] Its first meaning would then have been “hole, empty space, yawning opening”, and it has long been connected with χάσκω (kháskō, “to gape”), χάσμα (khásma, “chasm”) and χήμη (khḗmē).^[2][1] Wiktionary takes the root to be Proto-Indo-European *gʰeh₂- (“to yawn, gape”), also seen in Germanic and Baltic words for the palate such as Old High German guomo and Lithuanian gomurỹs.^[1][2] Frisk stressed that we do not know what Hesiod imagined by the word, which limits any etymology.^[3]

Ancient writers derived it from χέω (khéō, “to pour”), as Zeno the Stoic did, who took the first element to be water, or from a verb “to give way, contain”.^[4][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Hesiod's Theogony begins its account of the world: “first of all Chaos came to be, and then broad-breasted Earth”.^[5][6] The first thing to exist was later usually taken, from Aristotle on, to be empty space.^[2][3]

Semantic evolution

Ibycus, Bacchylides and Aristophanes use it for the empty expanse of air where birds fly.^[6][5] Philosophers saw in it infinite space, as Sextus and Plotinus, or unformed matter, as Lucian; for the Stoics it was water.^[5] Later it was the nether abyss and infinite darkness, joined with Erebus, and Apollonius of Rhodes used it for the black of a starless night.^[5][6] The Septuagint uses it for a gaping chasm.^[7][5]

Latin borrowed it as chaos, and the Vulgate's use for the formless state of the world before creation led to the sense “utter confusion” in English about 1600.^[1][8] Dutch gas was formed from it.^[1] Modern Greek χάος (cháos) is a learned word for the primordial chaos, for space, and, after French, for disorder.^[9][4]

Timeline

• Before the 6th century BC – Hesiod makes Chaos the first thing to exist.^[5][6]
• 6th century BC – Ibycus uses it for the expanse of air.^[5]
• 5th–4th century BC – Aristophanes' birds fly through it.^[6][5]
• 4th century BC – Aristotle interprets it as empty space.^[2][5]
• 4th–3rd century BC – Zeno the Stoic identifies it with water.^[4][5]
• 3rd century BC – Apollonius of Rhodes uses it for impenetrable darkness.^[6][5]
• Late 14th century – English borrows chaos.^[8]

Meanings

Noun

1. chaos, the first state of the universe.^[5][6]
2. Empty space, the expanse of air.^[5][6]
3. Unformed matter, or (Stoics) water.^[5]
4. The nether abyss; infinite darkness.^[5][6]
5. A gaping chasm.^[5][7]

Word family

• χαόω (khaóō)

Related words

• χαῦνος (khaûnos)
• χάσκω (kháskō)
• χάσμα (khásma)
• Latin chaos
• English chaos
• English gas

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e 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 Frisk, Hjalmar (1960–1972), Griechisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3 vols, Heidelberg: Carl Winter
4. ^ a b c Etygram: ancient etymologies of Greek words, CEPAM, Université Côte d'Azur, http://appsweb-cepam.unice.fr/etygram
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert; Jones, Henry Stuart (1940), A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i Diggle, James, et al., eds. (2021), The Cambridge Greek Lexicon, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
7. ^ a b Lust, Johan; Eynikel, Erik; Hauspie, Katrin (2003), Greek-English Lexicon of the Septuagint, rev. ed., Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft
8. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
9. ^ Ινστιτούτο Νεοελληνικών Σπουδών (Ίδρυμα Μανόλη Τριανταφυλλίδη) (1998), Λεξικό της κοινής νεοελληνικής, Thessaloniki: Aristotle University of Thessaloniki