ὡρολόγιον

Forms

ὡρολόγιον (hōrológion) n (genitive ὡρολογίου); second declension^[1]

Etymology

It is formed from Ancient Greek ὡρολόγος (hōrológos) + -ιον (-ion), a noun of instrument from the word for one who tells the hours.^[1][2] That noun is made from ὥρα (hṓra, “hour, season”) and λέγω (légō, “to tell, count”).^[1][3][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Its first records name sundials: an Attic description of the Piraeus, written in the 3rd century BC and preserved on a papyrus, mentions a sundial at Zea, and an inscription from Pergamon, probably of 127 or 126 BC, has the phrase “from the shadow-clock”.^[5]

Semantic evolution

The word covered every instrument for telling the time: the sundial, the water-clock, which was also called κλεψύδρα (klepsúdra), and a night clock attributed to Plato that worked like a water-clock.^[5][6][7] The astronomers Geminus and Cleomedes use it, and Plutarch speaks of clocks in his Platonic Questions.^[5][8] The Suda spells it ὡρολογεῖον.^[5]

It was borrowed as Latin horologium.^[9] In Byzantine Greek it also named the book of hours of the Orthodox Church, with the texts of the daily services.^[1] In speech the word lost its unstressed first vowel, giving medieval ρολόγιν, and then its middle consonant, giving Modern Greek ρολόι (rolói), a clock or watch.^[4][10]

Timeline

• 3rd century BC – An Attic periegesis, preserved on a papyrus, mentions a sundial at Zea.^[5]
• 2nd century BC – An inscription from Pergamon, probably of 127 or 126 BC, speaks of the shadow-clock.^[5]
• 1st century BC – Geminus uses it in his astronomical handbook.^[5][8][11]
• 1st–2nd century AD – Plutarch uses it of clocks.^[5][8][11]
• 2nd century AD – Aristocles, quoted by Athenaeus, describes a water-clock and Plato's night clock.^[5][6][11]
• Byzantine period – It is the name of the book of hours.^[1]
• Modern Greek – It survives as the everyday word for a clock or watch.^[10][4]

Meanings

Noun

1. An instrument for telling the time, a clock: a sundial or a water clock.^[5][2][7]
2. (Byzantine) The horologion, the book of hours of the Byzantine liturgy.^[1]

Word family

• ὡρολογικός (hōrologikós)

Related words

• ὥρα (hṓra)
• λέγω (légō)
• κλεψύδρα (klepsúdra)
• Latin horologium
• Modern Greek ρολόι (rolói)

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b Bailly, Anatole (2020), Dictionnaire grec-français, Bailly 2020 Hugo Chávez ed., ed. Gérard Gréco et al.
3. ^ Malhadas, Daisi; Dezotti, Maria Celeste C.; Neves, Maria Helena de Moura, eds. (2006–2010), Dicionário Grego-Português, São Paulo: Ateliê; digital ed. 3 (2022), UNESP Araraquara
4. ^ a b c Babiniotis, Georgios (2010), Ετυμολογικό λεξικό της νέας ελληνικής γλώσσας [Etymological Dictionary of Modern Greek], Athens: Κέντρο Λεξικολογίας
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert; Jones, Henry Stuart (1940), A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b Pape, Wilhelm (1914), Griechisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 3rd ed., rev. Max Sengebusch, Braunschweig: Vieweg
7. ^ a b Korinthios, J. (2025), Grande Dizionario Greco Classico: Greco–Italiano, digital ed., Milan: Hoepli
8. ^ a b c Keersmaekers, Alek (2021–2025), GLAUx: The Greek Language Automated corpus, https://github.com/alekkeersmaekers/glaux
9. ^ Saalfeld, Günther Alexander (1874), Index Graecorum vocabulorum in linguam latinam translatorum, Berlin: Weidmann
10. ^ a b Ινστιτούτο Νεοελληνικών Σπουδών (Ίδρυμα Μανόλη Τριανταφυλλίδη) (1998), Λεξικό της κοινής νεοελληνικής, Thessaloniki: Aristotle University of Thessaloniki
11. ^ a b c Rodríguez Adrados, Francisco, et al., eds. (1980–), Diccionario Griego-Español, Madrid: CSIC, http://dge.cchs.csic.es/xdge