Etymologically
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ἕσπερος

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Pronunciation

  • 5th-century BC Attic: /hés.pe.ros/[1]
  • 4th-century AD Koine: /ˈes.pe.ros/[1]
  • 10th-century Byzantine: /ˈes.pe.ros/[1]

Forms

ἕσπερος (hésperos) m or f (neuter ἕσπερον); second declension[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Proto-Hellenic *wésperos,[1] inherited from Proto-Indo-European *wek(ʷ)speros (“evening”).[1][2] It is the same word as Latin vesper (“evening”); Lithuanian vãkaras and Old Church Slavonic вєчєръ (večerŭ) go back to a form without the ⟨-s-⟩, and related words are found in Celtic, such as Welsh ucher, and in Old Armenian գիշեր (gišer).[2][3][1] Homer still shows the initial digamma, ϝέσπερος (wésperos).[4]

The forms long resisted a single reconstruction.[2][3] Beekes explains the Armenian ⟨š⟩ from a cluster ⟨-k(w)s-⟩, which together with the ⟨-k-⟩ and ⟨-sp-⟩ of the other languages points to ⟨-kʷsp-⟩;[2] this has been identified with the Sanskrit word for “night”, whose zero grade is seen in Hittite išpant- (“night”).[2] The word may have meant “(stretching) towards night”, and its suffix ⟨-er-⟩ recurs in time words such as νυκτερός (nukterós, “nightly”).[2] Havers thought the variation between the languages was due to taboo, which Frisk queries.[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

In the Iliad it is the evening star, ἀστὴρ ἕσπερος, (22.318); in the Odyssey it is the evening itself, as when “dark evening came on” (1.423), and the neuter plural ἕσπερα means evening-time (17.191).[4][5]

Semantic evolution

Hesiod and Pindar use it for the evening,[6][5] and Sappho addresses the Evening Star: “Hesperus, you bring back all that the shining dawn scattered” (ἔσπερε πάντα φέρων ὄσα φαίνολις ἐσκέδας’ αὔως).[5] Later it names the planet Venus.[5][6] As an adjective it means “of the evening” and, since the evening is in the west, “western”: Aeschylus speaks of western lands, and Sophocles calls Hades the “western god”, whose home was in the west, the region of darkness.[5][6] Aristotle quotes the proverb “neither the evening nor the morning star is so wonderful”.[5]

The feminine ἑσπέρα (hespérā), formed after ἡμέρα (hēmérā, “day”), became the usual word for “evening, west”.[2] An epigram uses ἕσπερος of old age.[5] Modern Greek has έσπερος as a learned name for the evening star.[7]

Timeline

  • Homer – The Iliad uses it for the evening star, and the Odyssey for the evening.[4][5]
  • Before the 6th century BC – Hesiod uses it for the evening.[5][8]
  • 7th–6th century BC – Sappho addresses the Evening Star.[5][8]
  • 6th–5th century BC – Aeschylus uses it as an adjective, “western”.[5][8]
  • 5th century BC – Sophocles calls Hades the “western god”.[5][6][8]
  • 4th century BC – Aristotle quotes a proverb about the evening and morning stars.[5][8]
  • 4th–3rd century BC – Callimachus uses it for the west.[6][8]
  • Modern Greek – It survives as a learned word for the evening star.[7]

Meanings

Noun

  1. Evening.[6][5]
  2. The evening star, Hesperus, the planet Venus.[6][5]
  3. The west.[6]

Adjective

  1. Of or at evening; lit at evening.[5][6]
  2. Western, in or towards the west.[6][5]
  3. Of a god, whose home is in the west, said of Hades.[6][5]

Word family

  • ἑσπέρα (hespérā)
  • ἑσπέριος (hespérios)

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g 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 c Frisk, Hjalmar (1960–1972), Griechisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3 vols, Heidelberg: Carl Winter
  4. ^ a b c Cunliffe, Richard John (1924), A Lexicon of the Homeric Dialect, London: Blackie and Son
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r 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 j k Diggle, James, et al., eds. (2021), The Cambridge Greek Lexicon, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
  7. ^ a b Babiniotis, Georgios (2010), Ετυμολογικό λεξικό της νέας ελληνικής γλώσσας [Etymological Dictionary of Modern Greek], Athens: Κέντρο Λεξικολογίας
  8. ^ a b c d e f Rodríguez Adrados, Francisco, et al., eds. (1980–), Diccionario Griego-Español, Madrid: CSIC, http://dge.cchs.csic.es/xdge