ἶρις

See also: ίρις and Ἶρις

Ancient Greek

Alternative forms

ἔρῐς (éris)

Etymology

Originally with an initial digamma, as *ϝῖρις (*wîris); further origin uncertain. The traditional etymology, from Proto-Indo-European *wih₁-r- (“a twist, thread, cord, wire”) (compare English wire, Swedish vira (“to twist”), Welsh gŵyr (“bent”)), from *weyh₁- (“to turn, twist, weave, plait”), is suspicious on account of the irregular variation between ⟨ε⟩ and ⟨ι⟩ as well as the suffix -ις (-is), -ιδος (-idos). Furthermore, even the derivation of *ϝῖρ- (*wîr-) seems phonetically improbable given the modern reconstruction of the root as *weh₁-y-. Thus, Furnée and Beekes argue for Pre-Greek origin.^[1]^[2]^[3]

Pronunciation

(5^th BCE Attic) IPA^(key): /îː.ris/
(1^st CE Egyptian) IPA^(key): /ˈi.ris/
(4^th CE Koine) IPA^(key): /ˈi.ris/
(10^th CE Byzantine) IPA^(key): /ˈi.ris/
(15^th CE Constantinopolitan) IPA^(key): /ˈi.ris/

Noun

ἶρις • (îris) f (genitive ῑ̓́ρῐδος); third declension

rainbow
halo
various species of the genus Iris

Declension

Third declension of ἡ ἶρῐς; τῆς ῑ̓́ρῐδος (Attic)

Case / #	Singular	Dual	Plural
Nominative	ἡ ἶρῐς hē îris	τὼ ῑ̓́ρῐδε tṑ ī́ride	αἱ ῑ̓́ρῐδες hai ī́rides
Genitive	τῆς ῑ̓́ρῐδος tês ī́ridos	τοῖν ῑ̓ρῐ́δοιν toîn īrídoin	τῶν ῑ̓ρῐ́δων tôn īrídōn
Dative	τῇ ῑ̓́ρῐδῐ têi ī́ridi	τοῖν ῑ̓ρῐ́δοιν toîn īrídoin	ταῖς ῑ̓́ρῐσῐ / ῑ̓́ρῐσῐν taîs ī́risi(n)
Accusative	τὴν ἶριν / ἴρῐδα tḕn îrin / írida	τὼ ῑ̓́ρῐδε tṑ ī́ride	τᾱ̀ς ῑ̓́ρῐδᾰς tā̀s ī́ridas
Vocative	ἶρι îri	ῑ̓́ρῐδε ī́ride	ῑ̓́ρῐδες ī́rides
Notes:	This table gives Attic inflectional endings. For declension in other dialects, see Appendix:Ancient Greek dialectal declension. Nominative singular -ς (-s) arose by reduction of the original cluster *-ds.

Derived terms

ἴρινος (írinos)

References

^ Furnée, Edzard Johan (1972) Die wichtigsten konsonantischen Erscheinungen des Vorgriechischen (Janua linguarum. Series practica; 150) (in German), The Hague and Paris: Mouton, page 356
^ Beekes, Robert S. P. (2010) “ἶρις, -ιδος”, in Etymological Dictionary of Greek (Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series; 10), with the assistance of Lucien van Beek, Leiden, Boston: Brill, →ISBN, page 598
^ Beekes, Robert S. P. (2014) “ἶρις, -ιδος”, in Stefan Norbruis, editor, Pre-Greek: Phonology, Morphology, Lexicon, Leiden: Brill, →ISBN, page 48