ἵκω + θύω2
Word
Validation
No
Word-form
ἰχθύς
Word-lemma
Transliteration (Word)
ikhthus
English translation (word)
fish
Transliteration (Etymon)
hikō + thuō
English translation (etymon)
ti arrive + to rage
Century
12 AD
Source
idem
Ref.
Comm. Il., vol. 1, p. 689
Ed.
M. van der Valk, Eustathii archiepiscopi Thessalonicensis commentarii ad Homeri Iliadem pertinentes, vols. 1-4, Leiden: Brill, 1:1971; 2:1976; 3:1979; 4:1987
Quotation
καὶ ἐκ τοῦ ἱκέσθαι καὶ θύειν ὁ ἰχθύς
Translation (En)
And ikhthus "fish" comes from hikesthai "to arrive" and thuein "to rush forward"
Parallels
Eustathius, ibid., vol. 3, p. 461 (Οὕτω καὶ τὸ ἰχθύς ζητεῖ μὲν δασύνεσθαι, γίνεται γὰρ παρὰ τὸ ἰκέσθαι καὶ θύειν, ὅ ἐστιν ὁρμᾶν, πολυκίνητον γὰρ ζῷον ὁ ἰχθύς. ἀλλὰ μεταβληθὲν τὸ ψιλὸν κ εἰς δασὺ τὸ χ μετέτρεψε τὴν δασύτητα τοῦ πνεύματος εἰς τὸ ἔμπαλιν); Comm. Od., vol. 2, p. 22 (Ἐτυμολογία δὲ ἰχθύος ἐκ τοῦ ἷγμαι ἷξαι ἷκται, τραπέντων τῶν δύο ψιλῶν συμφώνων εἰς τὰ σφῶν ἀντίστοιχα, καὶ ἀκολούθως ψιλωθέντος καὶ τοῦ κατάρχοντος ἰῶτα διὰ τὸ ἐπαγόμενον δασὺ χ, οὗ περ οὐ δύναται προκεῖσθαι δασεῖα, δίχα γε τοῦ ᾗχι ὅ πέρ ἐστιν ὅπου)
Modern etymology
Isolated within Greek, ἰχθύς has a cognate in Lith. žuvìs "fish", Arm. jukn. PIE *dhghuH- (Beekes, EDG)
Persistence in Modern Greek
MG still has ιχθύς as the learned technical word in zoology. The usual name for "fish" is ψάρι, which is unrelated
Entry By
Le Feuvre
Comment
Compositional etymology. The second member is identical with the etymon in the derivational etymology (see ἰχθύς / θύω2) and the first two letters are identified as a form of the verb ἱκνέομαι "to arrive, to reach". Accordingly, the compound has a structure VV — a type that does not exist in Greek but Greek scholars were not aware of that. The first member ἱκνέομαι was deduced from the fact that it starts with /ik/ (in a pilotis state of the language), and from a Homeric line where fish is the subject of the verb ἱκνέομαι (Od. 12.331 ἰχθῦς ὄρνιθάς τε, φίλας ὅ τι χεῖρας ἵκοιτο, "fish and birds, everything that came into their hands"). Therefore, following a customary principle, this synchronic vicinity was interpreted as a figura etymologica. The fish is the one that rushes to arrive.