Etymologically
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ἀείδω

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Pronunciation

  • 5th-century BC Attic: /a.ěː.dɔː/[1]
  • 4th-century AD Koine: /aˈi.ðo/[1]
  • 10th-century Byzantine: /aˈi.ðo/[1]

Forms

ᾰ̓είδω (aeídō) [1] The contracted form ᾄδω (áidō) is the usual one in Attic, tragedy and Plato; ἀείδω is the Epic, lyric and Ionic form.[2][3]

Etymology

It is inherited from Proto-Hellenic *awéidō.[1] Beekes takes the ablaut of the family to point to Proto-Indo-European *h₂weid-, but no cognate outside Greek is known, and LIV records the root only with a question mark.[4][5] Within Greek it belongs with αὐδή (audḗ, “voice”) and perhaps ἀηδών (aēdṓn, “nightingale”).[4][6]

Wackernagel derived the present from a reduplicated aorist, comparable to ἔειπον (éeipon, “I said”);[6] LIV rejects this, and Frisk thinks a reduplicated aorist beside the noun should have had a different shape.[6][5] Harðarson reconstructed *h₂we-h₂ud-, which Beekes finds difficult because of the loss of the laryngeal.[4] Ancient grammarians explained it as an intensive prefix on εἴδω (eídō, “to know”), and Plutarch's grandfather Lamprias as built on /a/, the first sound a child makes.[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

The Iliad opens with it, asking the goddess to sing of the wrath of Achilles; in Homer it means to sing, or to sing of a subject.[2][8]

Semantic evolution

From Homer on it is to sing, or to celebrate someone or something in song, and in the passive to be sung or celebrated.[3][2] It is used of birds singing, of cocks crowing and of cicadas chirping, and in Hellenistic poetry of a stone that rings when it is struck and of a tree in the wind.[3]

Its derivatives ἀοιδός (aoidós, “singer”) and the contracted ᾠδή (ōidḗ, “song”) gave Greek its words for the poet-singer and the ode.[6] Modern Greek has the contracted verb as άδω (ádo).[9]

Timeline

  • Homer – The Iliad and the Odyssey use it for singing a song or a theme.[2][8]
  • Before the 6th century BC – Hesiod's Theogony opens with it.[8]
  • 6th–5th century BC – Pindar uses the passive for a sanctuary filled with song.[2][3]
  • 3rd century BC – Theocritus uses it of a stone ringing when struck.[3]

Meanings

Verb

  1. To sing; with an accusative, to sing a song, hymn or poem.[2][3]
  2. To sing of, celebrate in song a god, a person or a deed; passive, to be celebrated.[2][3]
  3. (passive) Of a sanctuary, to be filled with song.[3]
  4. Of birds, to sing; of cocks, to crow; of cicadas, to chirp.[3]
  5. (figurative) Of a struck stone or a tree in the wind, to ring or sing out.[3]

Word family

  • ἀοιδή (aoidḗ)
  • ἀοίδιμος (aoídimos)
  • ἀοιδός (aoidós)
  • ᾠδή (ōidḗ)
  • ᾠδός (ōidós)
  • ἄεισμα (áeisma)
  • ᾆσμα (âisma)
  • αὐδή (audḗ)
  • ὑδέω (hudéō)
  • ἀηδών (aēdṓn)

References

  1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert; Jones, Henry Stuart (1940), A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Diggle, James, et al., eds. (2021), The Cambridge Greek Lexicon, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
  4. ^ a b c 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. ^ a b Rix, Helmut, et al. (2001), Lexikon der indogermanischen Verben, 2nd ed., Wiesbaden: Reichert
  6. ^ a b c d Frisk, Hjalmar (1960–1972), Griechisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3 vols, Heidelberg: Carl Winter
  7. ^ Etygram: ancient etymologies of Greek words, CEPAM, Université Côte d'Azur, http://appsweb-cepam.unice.fr/etygram
  8. ^ a b c Keersmaekers, Alek (2021–2025), GLAUx: The Greek Language Automated corpus, https://github.com/alekkeersmaekers/glaux
  9. ^ Babiniotis, Georgios (2010), Ετυμολογικό λεξικό της νέας ελληνικής γλώσσας [Etymological Dictionary of Modern Greek], Athens: Κέντρο Λεξικολογίας