ὠρεῖν (ὠρεύειν)
Word
Validation
Word-form
Word-lemma
Etymon-lemma
Transliteration (Word)
English translation (word)
Transliteration (Etymon)
English translation (etymon)
Century
Source
Ref.
Ed.
Quotation
Ὁ οὐρανός, ὦ παιδίον, περιέχει κύκλῳ τὴν γῆν καὶ τὴν θάλατταν καὶ τὰ ἐπὶ γῆς καὶ τὰ ἐν θαλάττῃ πάντα καὶ διὰ τοῦτο ταύτης ἔτυχε τῆς προσηγορίας, οὖρος ὢν ἄνω πάντων καὶ ὁρίζων τὴν φύσιν· ἔνιοι δέ φασιν ἀπὸ τοῦ ὠρεῖν ἢ ὠρεύειν τὰ ὄντα, ὅ ἐστι φυλάττειν, οὐρανὸν κεκλῆσθαι, ἀφ’ οὗ καὶ ὁ θυρωρὸς ὠνομάσθη καὶ τὸ πολυωρεῖν· ἄλλοι δὲ αὐτὸν ἀπὸ τοῦ ὁρᾶσθαι ἄνω ἐτυμολογοῦσι
Translation (En)
"Sky" (ouranos), my boy, encloses in its circle the earth and the sea and everything that is on earth and in the sea, and this is where it got its name from, being the guardian (ouros) of all things, above (anō), and delimitating the natural world. But some say that it is called ouranos because it “takes care” (ōreîn) or “has care of” (ōreuein) things, i.e. ‘guards’ them. This is where the word thurōros ‘door-keeper’ comes from; also polyōrein ‘to care for’. And others yet think its etymology is “to look upwards" (horâsthai anō)
Parallels
Joannes Galenus, Allegoriae in Hesiodi Theogoniam p. 310 (πατρός γε δυσωνύμου. δυσώνυμος δὲ ὁ οὐρανὸς λέγεται κατὰ ἀντίφρασιν, ἤγουν διότι ὠρεῖ, τουτέστι φυλάσσει καὶ ἔνδον ἑαυτοῦ ἀποκλείει τὰ πάντα)
Comment
This etymology seems to start from a non Attic-Ionic form of "sky", ὠρανός, found in Doric dialects (doris severior vocalism), well known in poetry (Doric and Aeolic), which allows for a paronymic relationship with ὠρέω "to take care". It was probably designed as an alternative to the older etymology explaining οὐρανός by οὖρος (see οὐρανός / οὖρος), and is meant to account for the Doric form, which the former etymology cannot explain. The idea that two dialectal variants must have two different etymologies was commonplace in Greek thought.