ῥίον

See also: Ῥίον

Ancient Greek

Etymology

The word is isolated within Hellenic and has no certain etymology. If it originally had an initial "ϝ-", it would recall βρία (bría, “town”) and perhaps also Tocharian B riye (“town”). The connections with Proto-Germanic *risiz (“giant”), Latin verrūca (“wart”), Proto-Slavic *vьrxъ (“top, peak”) and Sanskrit वर्ष्मन् (varṣman, “height, top”) are no better. As an alternative to all these problematic suggestions, Beekes considers the possibility that the word is of Pre-Greek origin.

Attested in Mycenaean Greek as 𐀪𐀍 (ri-jo).

Pronunciation

 

• IPA^(key): /r̥í.on/ → /ˈri.on/ → /ˈri.on/

• (5^th BCE Attic) IPA^(key): /r̥í.on/
• (1^st CE Egyptian) IPA^(key): /ˈri.on/
• (4^th CE Koine) IPA^(key): /ˈri.on/
• (10^th CE Byzantine) IPA^(key): /ˈri.on/
• (15^th CE Constantinopolitan) IPA^(key): /ˈri.on/

Noun

ῥίον • (rhíon) n (genitive ῥίου); second declension

1. peak, summit, any jutting part of a mountain
2. headland
3. bay formed by a foreland

Inflection

Second declension of τὸ ῥῐ́ον; τοῦ ῥῐ́ου (Attic)

Case / #	Singular	Dual	Plural
Nominative	τὸ ῥῐ́ον tò rhíon	τὼ ῥῐ́ω tṑ rhíō	τᾰ̀ ῥῐ́ᾰ tà rhía
Genitive	τοῦ ῥῐ́ου toû rhíou	τοῖν ῥῐ́οιν toîn rhíoin	τῶν ῥῐ́ων tôn rhíōn
Dative	τῷ ῥῐ́ῳ tôi rhíōi	τοῖν ῥῐ́οιν toîn rhíoin	τοῖς ῥῐ́οις toîs rhíois
Accusative	τὸ ῥῐ́ον tò rhíon	τὼ ῥῐ́ω tṑ rhíō	τᾰ̀ ῥῐ́ᾰ tà rhía
Vocative	ῥῐ́ον rhíon	ῥῐ́ω rhíō	ῥῐ́ᾰ rhía
Notes:	This table gives Attic inflectional endings. For declension in other dialects, see Appendix:Ancient Greek dialectal declension.

Derived terms

• Ῥίον (Rhíon)

Further reading

• “ῥίον”, in Liddell & Scott (1940) A Greek–English Lexicon, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• ῥίον in Bailly, Anatole (1935) Le Grand Bailly: Dictionnaire grec-français, Paris: Hachette
• Beekes, Robert S. P. (2010) “ῥίον”, in Etymological Dictionary of Greek (Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series; 10), with the assistance of Lucien van Beek, Leiden, Boston: Brill, →ISBN, page 1287