phasis

Forms

phasis f (genitive phasis); third declension^[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ancient Greek φάσις (phásis, “appearance, rising of a star; statement”),^[2][3][4] from the stem of φαίνω (phaínō, “to show, make appear”).^[4][3] Wiktionary traces it to Proto-Indo-European *bʰeh₂- (“to shine”);^[1] Köbler names that root and, for the sense “statement”, a homonymous root meaning “to speak”.^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

Köbler's first source is Chalcidius (c. 300 AD).^[2] The TLL's first sense is a technical term of vision, for what is seen simply and directly as opposed to what is seen in mirrors.^[3]

Semantic evolution

In rhetoric and logic it rendered the Greek term for a statement: the rhetorical treatise the TLL cites under Augustine's name divides it into affirmation and denial, a minor rhetorician calls it the matter from which a question arises, and Boethius translates it as dictio.^[3] In New Latin it meant an appearance and a phase, as of the moon;^[1] English phase was made from its plural phases.^[4]

Timeline

• c. 300 AD – Chalcidius has the word.^[2]
• early 6th century AD – Boethius renders it as dictio.^[3][2]
• 1705 – English forms phase from the New Latin plural phases.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. (Late Latin) An appearance, what is seen directly.^[3][2]
2. (Late Latin, rhetoric) A statement or assertion.^[3]
3. (New Latin) A phase, as of the moon or a planet.^[1][4]

Usage notes

It is not the same word as Phāsis, the river of Colchis flowing into the Black Sea, which Catullus already names,^[5][6] from which the phāsiānus (“pheasant”) took its name;^[7][2] the OLD also has an adjective Phāsis “Colchian”, used as a noun for Medea.^[5] The TLL records a third phasis, an adjective meaning “of the pheasant”, in Martial.^[3][2]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. ^ a b Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ Latham, R. E., D. R. Howlett, R. K. Ashdowne, et al. (1975–2013), Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources, London: British Academy / Oxford University Press