ἴονθος

Ancient Greek

Etymology

May belong to a word for "hair", which appears in Middle Irish find (“hair”), Dutch wenkbrauw (“eyebrow”), Old Prussian wanso (“first beard”) and Proto-Slavic *ǫsъ (“moustache”). The Greek word would have to represent a reduplicated formation *ϝί-ϝονθος (*wí-wonthos). All these words have been interpreted as verbal nouns from Proto-Indo-European *wendʰ- (“hair, wool, beard”).

For a similar semantic shift compare Georgian თმა (tma, “hair”) ~ Svan შდო̈მ (šdöm, “rash”).

Pronunciation

 

Noun

ἴονθος • (íonthos) m (genitive ἰόνθου); second declension

  1. root of a hair, downy hair
  2. eruption on the face, which accompanies the first growth of the beard

Inflection

Derived terms

  • ἰονθάς (ionthás)
  • ἰονθώδης (ionthṓdēs)

Further reading

This article is issued from Wiktionary. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.