πρόσειμι

Validation

Yes

Last modification

Tue, 11/16/2021 - 08:40

Word-form

πόσις

Transliteration (Word)

posis (ho)

English translation (word)

husband

Transliteration (Etymon)

proseimi

English translation (etymon)

to approach

Author

Scholia in Sophoclem

Century

varia

Source

Idem

Ref.

Scholia vetera in Sophoclis Trachinias 550

Ed.

G. A. Xenis, Scholia vetera in Sophoclis Trachinias [Sammlung griechischer und lateinischer Grammatiker (SGLG) Band 13. Berlin - New York: De Gruyter, 2010]

Quotation

πόσις: πρόσις τις ὢν παρὰ τὸ προσιέναι

Translation (En)

Posis "husband", a *prosis, as it were, from prosienai "to approach"

Comment

This etymology implies a phonetic manipulation, the loss of the [r]. The scholiast may have had in mind the fact that the Doric and Aeolic form matching Ionic-Attic πρός is ποτί, which has no [r]. The etymology starts from the participle of the verb, προσίων, hence *ποσίων with dropping of the [r], which happens to be the genitive plural of "husband" (although that is not explicit in the formulation). This is a functional etymology: the husband is defined as the one who approaches his wife for sexual union

Parallels

There are no parallels.

Modern etymology

Older πότις "lord", from PIE *poti- "lord", found in Vedic páti- "id.", Lat. potior "more powerful". Related within Greek to δεσπότης, πότνια, δέσποινα (Beekes, EDG)

Persistence in Modern Greek

No

Entry By

Le Feuvre