ὄπιον

Pronunciation

• IPA (5th-century BC Attic): /ó.pi.on/^[1]
• IPA (4th-century AD Koine): /ˈo.pi.on/^[1]
• IPA (10th-century Byzantine): /ˈo.pi.on/^[1]

Forms

ὄπῐον (ópion) n (genitive ὀπῐ́ου); second declension^[1]

Etymology

It is a diminutive of ὀπός (opós, “plant juice”), with the suffix -ιον (-ion).^[2][1][3] Ὀπός, with Ionic loss of the rough breathing, is from Proto-Indo-European *sokʷo- (“juice, resin”).^[4][3]

Ὀπός is cognate with Old Church Slavonic сокъ (sokŭ, “juice”) and Lithuanian sakaĩ (“resin”).^[4][3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The earliest example is a fragment of the physician Diocles of Carystus, for poppy juice.^[2]

Semantic evolution

Dioscorides, Pliny and Galen use it for opium, the juice of the poppy, as a drug, and a papyrus of the 1st century AD lists it among medicines.^[2][3] Latin borrowed it as opium, and Middle Persian as apiyōn, the source of the Persian and Arabic words.^[1] English took opium from Latin in the late 14th century.^[3]

Timeline

• 4th–3rd century BC – Diocles of Carystus uses it for poppy juice.^[2]
• 1st century AD – Dioscorides and Pliny describe opium.^[2]
• 2nd century AD – Galen uses it as a drug.^[2]
• Late 14th century – English borrows opium from Latin.^[3]

Meanings

Noun

1. Poppy juice, opium.^[2][1]

Related words

• ὀπός (opós)
• μήκων (mḗkōn)
• Latin opium
• English opium

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 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 Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b 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