Maia

Forms

Maia f sg (genitive Maiae); first declension^[1] Cicero wrote Maiia, as Quintilian reports;^[2] Ovid has the Greek accusative Maian.^[2]

Etymology

The mother of Mercury is borrowed from Ancient Greek Μαῖα (Maîa),^[3][1] a name connected with μαῖα (maîa, “little mother, nurse, midwife”).^[4][1]

The origin of the Roman goddess of the same name, honoured in May, is uncertain.^[1][5] Georges explains the name as “the exalted one” and refers to ⟨maius⟩;^[6] Wiktionary suggests a native Latin formation from Proto-Indo-European *méǵh₂s (“great”), later merged with the Greek figure.^[1] De Vaan derives the month name ⟨Māius⟩ from the stem of magnus (“great”),^[7] and reports the Roman explanation of māiālis (“barrow pig”) as the pig sacrificed to Maia, which he thinks may be a popular etymology.^[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

The earliest author the OLD quotes is Accius, of Maia conceiving in her womb.^[2][4]

Semantic evolution

In poetry she is chiefly the mother of Mercury by Jupiter, so that Virgil's phrase Maiā genitum, “born of Maia”, stands for Mercury himself;^[2][3] Isidore of Seville gives this as an example of antonomasia.^[8] She was also one of the Pleiades, and Cicero and Virgil name her as a star.^[2][5]

Gellius names a Maia as the wife of Vulcan,^[2] and Macrobius describes Maia as a Roman goddess of spring whose festival fell in May.^[5] In modern astronomy the name is given to a star of the Pleiades in Taurus.^[1]

Timeline

• 170–c. 90 BC – Accius names Maia as the mother of Mercury.^[2][4]
• 81–43 BC – Cicero names her as one of the Pleiades.^[2][4]
• 70–19 BC – Virgil calls Mercury Maiā genitum.^[2][4]
• c. 165 AD – Gellius names Maia as the wife of Vulcan.^[2][4]
• 1st half of the 5th century AD – Macrobius speaks of Maia as a goddess honoured in May.^[5][4]

Meanings

Proper noun

1. (mythology) Maia, daughter of Atlas and mother of Mercury by Jupiter.^[2][6]
2. One of the Pleiades, also as a star.^[2][5][1]
3. The wife of Vulcan.^[2]
4. A Roman goddess of spring and growth, honoured in May.^[5][1]

Word family

• Māiadēs

Related words

• magnus
• māiestās

Usage notes

Lowercase maia was a separate word: a large kind of crab in Pliny the Elder,^[3][5] and, by a conjecture in the poet Cyprian of Gaul, a midwife, Greek μαῖα (maîa).^[9]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
4. ^ a b c d e f g Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
5. ^ a b c d e f g Gaffiot, Félix (2016), Dictionnaire latin-français, new ed. by Gérard Gréco et al. (Gaffiot 2016), online ed.
6. ^ a b Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
7. ^ a b de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
8. ^ Isidore of Seville, Etymologiarum sive Originum libri XX, ed. W. M. Lindsay (Oxford, 1911)., p. 1.37.11
9. ^ Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften