πάξ

Ancient Greek

FWOTD – 5 August 2023

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin pāx! (“peace! quiet! enough talking!”), from Proto-Italic *pāks, from Proto-Indo-European *péh₂ḱ-s (“peace”), from the root *peh₂ḱ- (“to join, to attach”).

Pronunciation

(5^th BCE Attic) IPA^(key): /pǎːks/
(1^st CE Egyptian) IPA^(key): /paks/
(4^th CE Koine) IPA^(key): /paks/
(10^th CE Byzantine) IPA^(key): /paks/
(15^th CE Constantinopolitan) IPA^(key): /paks/

Interjection

πᾱ́ξ! • (pā́x!)

enough!, oh!, bah!, good!
- 342 BCE – 290 BCE, Menander, Epitrepontes 987:
  πάξ. μὴ βλέπ᾿ εἰς τ[ὴν ψάλτριαν
  páx. mḕ blép’ eis t[ḕn psáltrian
  Therefore, Halt! No more ogling of the harpist!
- 300 BCE – 200 BCE, Herodas, 7.114:
  εἶ σίνος, θῶ μιν. πάξ·
  eî sínos, thô min. páx;
  Give me your foot; slip it in the shoe. Good!
- 342 BCE – 291 BCE, Diphilus, fragment 96.2

Further reading

“πάξ”, in Liddell & Scott (1940) A Greek–English Lexicon, Oxford: Clarendon Press
πάξ in Bailly, Anatole (1935) Le Grand Bailly: Dictionnaire grec-français, Paris: Hachette
πάξ, in ΛΟΓΕΙΟΝ [Logeion] Dictionaries for Ancient Greek and Latin (in English, French, Spanish, German, Dutch and Chinese), University of Chicago, since 2011