χολή

Forms

χολή (kholḗ) f (genitive χολῆς); first declension^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Proto-Hellenic *kʰolā́ (“gall, bile”), inherited from Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰolh₃-éh₂, from *ǵʰelh₃- (“green, yellow”).^[1] Chantraine treats it and χόλος (khólos) as old primary nouns of one root, alongside Latin holus (“vegetable”), though no primary verb survives to show the root's meaning.^[2] The name probably comes from the colour of bile.^[3][4][5]

Words for bile and for yellow built on the same root with other suffixes include Avestan zāra (“bile”), which may match χόλος (khólos) exactly, Old Norse gall (“bile, poison”), fel (“bile”), Sanskrit हरि (hári, “yellow, tawny”) and helvus (“yellowish”).^[2][1][6] Greek χλωρός (khlōrós, “pale green”) and χλόη (khlóē, “young green shoots”) probably belong to the same family.^[3][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first author to use it is Archilochus, in the 7th century BC.^[7][5] In his verse bile is the seat of fighting spirit.^[8]

Semantic evolution

The older χόλος (khólos) means bile only once in Homer and is otherwise used for anger, so the two forms came to share the work: χολή became the medical word for bile and χόλος the word for the angry mood.^[2] The split was never complete: in poetry, above all in comedy, χολή also means bitter anger, and in Menander it is the excess of bile thought to cause madness.^[3][8]

Tragedy uses it for the gall-bladder of the sacrificial victim, which the seer inspects.^[8][3] Hippocratic medicine distinguishes yellow and black bile, and the ancients counted bile and black bile among the four humours thought to govern temperament, an idea that lives on in μελαγχολία (melankholíā).^[3][5] Nicander uses it for the ink of the cuttlefish.^[3]

In the Septuagint it renders several Hebrew words: gall, poison, wormwood and a poisonous plant.^[7][3] In the Gospel of Matthew Jesus is offered wine mixed with gall, and in Acts Peter tells Simon Magus that he is in the “gall of bitterness”.^[7] It was also borrowed into rabbinic Hebrew.^[7]

Old French borrowed the word as Old French colle.^[1] The English words choler and cholera come through Latin from the derived noun χολέρα (kholéra).^[4] Modern Greek keeps χολή (cholí) unchanged.^[9][5]

Timeline

• 7th century BC – Archilochus is the first author known to use it.^[7][10]
• 6th–5th century BC – Aeschylus uses it of the gall-bladder inspected in divination.^[3][8][10]
• 5th century BC – Thucydides uses it for bile in the body, and Hippocratic writers distinguish yellow from black bile.^[3][10]
• 5th–4th century BC – Aristophanes uses it for anger: a thing that “is bile already” makes one sick.^[3][10]
• 4th–3rd century BC – Menander uses it of black bile in the sense of madness.^[3][8][10]
• 2nd century BC – Nicander uses it for the ink of the cuttlefish.^[3][10]
• 1st century AD – The Gospel of Matthew tells that Jesus was given wine mixed with gall to drink.^[7]
• Modern Greek – The word survives as χολή (cholí) “bile”.^[9][5]

Meanings

Noun

1. Gall, bile; black bile and yellow bile in medicine.^[3][8]
2. The gall-bladder, especially of a sacrificial animal.^[3][8]
3. (figurative) Bitter anger, wrath.^[3][8]
4. Bile as the source of fighting spirit; fighting spirit.^[8]
5. (medicine) An excess of bile believed to cause madness; a fit of madness.^[8]
6. The ink of the cuttlefish.^[3]
7. (Septuagint) A poisonous plant; the venom of a snake.^[3][7]
8. (New Testament) A bitter drink; something bitter.^[7][8]

Word family

• πικρόχολος (pikrókholos)
• μελαγχολία (melankholíā)
• χολέρα (kholéra)

Related words

• χόλος (khólos)
• χλωρός (khlōrós)
• χλόη (khlóē)
• English choler
• English cholera

Usage notes

Proverbs with the word include “they wash out bitter bile with a bitter drug”, from Sophocles, and “to smear with gall”, said of putting someone off a thing, from the custom of putting gall on the nipple when a child was to be weaned.^[3] Alexis has the comparison “more bitter than gall itself”.^[3]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c 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
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert; Jones, Henry Stuart (1940), A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
4. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. ^ a b c d e f Babiniotis, Georgios (2010), Ετυμολογικό λεξικό της νέας ελληνικής γλώσσας [Etymological Dictionary of Modern Greek], Athens: Κέντρο Λεξικολογίας
6. ^ Pokorny, Julius (1959), Indogermanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, Bern; Munich: Francke
7. ^ a b c d e f g h 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
8. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Diggle, James, et al., eds. (2021), The Cambridge Greek Lexicon, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
9. ^ a b Ινστιτούτο Νεοελληνικών Σπουδών (Ίδρυμα Μανόλη Τριανταφυλλίδη) (1998), Λεξικό της κοινής νεοελληνικής, Thessaloniki: Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
10. ^ a b c d e f Rodríguez Adrados, Francisco, et al., eds. (1980–), Diccionario Griego-Español, Madrid: CSIC, http://dge.cchs.csic.es/xdge