ἡμέτερος

Forms

ἡμέτερος (hēméteros) m (feminine ἡμετέρᾱ, neuter ἡμέτερον); first/second declension^[1] Doric ἁμέτερος, Aeolic ἀμμέτερος; shorter possessives with the same meaning are Doric and poetic ἁμός (hāmós) and Aeolic ἄμμος (ámmos).^[2][3]

Etymology

It is formed from Ancient Greek ἡμεῖς (hēmeîs, “we”) + -τερος (-teros, “contrastive suffix”), from the stem of the plural pronoun with the suffix that marks one of two contrasted groups, “ours” as against “yours”.^[1][2][4] The dialect forms follow the pronoun: Doric ἁμέτερος (haméteros) beside ἁμές (hāmés), Aeolic ἀμμέτερος (amméteros) beside ἄμμες (ámmes).^[2][5]

Beekes and Frisk trace the pronoun to an old accusative, Aeolic ἄμμε (ámme) and Doric ἁμέ (hāmé), from earlier *ἀσμε (*asme), which matches Avestan ahma (“us”) exactly; they reconstruct Proto-Indo-European *n̥sme, built on the plural stem seen in Latin nōs and Gothic 𐌿𐌽𐍃 (uns) with an added element *-sme.^[2][4] The rough breathing of ἡμ- (hēm-) may have been taken over from ὑμεῖς (humeîs, “you”).^[2][4] Pokorny compares the Aeolic and Doric possessives with the Avestan possessive ahma-.^[6]

Earliest recorded meaning

It occurs from Homer on, meaning “our”, and in Homer it is often used by a single speaker for “my”.^[7][3] Without a noun it can mean “our house”: εἰς ἡμέτερον, “to our home”, in the Odyssey.^[7][3]

Semantic evolution

In Classical prose it is the ordinary possessive of the first person plural, and with the article it means “what is ours”: our land, our side, our affairs.^[3][8] Thucydides uses it where English would use an objective genitive, “the fear of us”.^[3] Theocritus and later poets use it for “my”, as Homer had done.^[3]

In the Septuagint and the New Testament it is less frequent than the genitive ἡμῶν, but it occurs with nouns and as “what is ours”.^[9] In the papyri τὰ ἡμέτερα is “my property”, and in Justinian's laws it appears in the emperor's titles of himself, “our clemency”.^[3]

Modern Greek has it as a learned word, ημέτερος (iméteros), “ours”, used ironically of a political ally, “one of us”.^[10]

Timeline

• Homer – The Iliad and the Odyssey use it for “our”, and a single speaker also uses it for “my”.^[7][11]
• Before the 6th century BC – Hesiod uses it in the Theogony and the Works and Days.^[11][12]
• 5th century BC – Herodotus and Thucydides use it in prose, Thucydides also for “the fear of us”.^[3][12]
• 1st century AD – The New Testament uses it in Acts and Paul's letters.^[9][3]
• 3rd century AD – A papyrus uses τὰ ἡμέτερα for “my property”.^[3]
• Modern Greek – The learned ημέτερος (iméteros) means “one of ours”, often ironically.^[10]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Our, belonging to us.^[3][8][9]
2. With the article, without a noun: what is ours, our home, our side or our affairs; in the plural, our people or our possessions.^[3][8][1]
3. Equivalent to an objective genitive: felt towards us, as “the fear of us”.^[3]
4. (poetic) My, used by a single speaker.^[3][7]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f 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 d e f g h i j k l m n Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert; Jones, Henry Stuart (1940), A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
4. ^ a b c Frisk, Hjalmar (1960–1972), Griechisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3 vols, Heidelberg: Carl Winter
5. ^ 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
6. ^ Pokorny, Julius (1959), Indogermanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, Bern; Munich: Francke
7. ^ a b c d Cunliffe, Richard John (1924), A Lexicon of the Homeric Dialect, London: Blackie and Son
8. ^ a b c Diggle, James, et al., eds. (2021), The Cambridge Greek Lexicon, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
9. ^ a b c 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
10. ^ a b Ινστιτούτο Νεοελληνικών Σπουδών (Ίδρυμα Μανόλη Τριανταφυλλίδη) (1998), Λεξικό της κοινής νεοελληνικής, Thessaloniki: Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
11. ^ a b Keersmaekers, Alek (2021–2025), GLAUx: The Greek Language Automated corpus, https://github.com/alekkeersmaekers/glaux
12. ^ a b Rodríguez Adrados, Francisco, et al., eds. (1980–), Diccionario Griego-Español, Madrid: CSIC, http://dge.cchs.csic.es/xdge