χωλός

Ancient Greek

Etymology

Seemingly, a formation with the suffix -λός like στρεβλός (streblós) and τυφλός (tuphlós), but without obvious etymology. Perhaps it belongs to χαλάω (khaláō, “to slacken, relax”) or perhaps from Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰeh₁- (“to leave behind, abandon”), the same root of χήρα (khḗra, “widow”), because a lame person is someone who lags or stays behind. Connections to Sanskrit खोर are uncertain.

Pronunciation

Adjective

χωλός • (khōlós) m (feminine χωλή, neuter χωλόν); first/second declension

1. lame, halting, limping

   Synonym: σκιμβός (skimbós)

   • 800 BCE – 600 BCE, Homer, Iliad 2.217
   • 800 BCE – 600 BCE, Homer, Iliad 9.503
   • 800 BCE – 600 BCE, Homer, Odyssey 8.308
   • 460 BCE – 420 BCE, Herodotus, Histories 5.92
   • 409 BCE, Sophocles, Philoctetes 486
   • 409 BCE, Sophocles, Philoctetes 1032
   • 460 BCE – 420 BCE, Herodotus, Histories 4.161
   • 411 BCE, Aristophanes, Thesmophoriazusae 24
   • 46 CE – 120 CE, Plutarch, Moralia 2.739B
   • 125 CE – 200 CE, Lucian, Timon 20
   • 446 BCE – 411 BCE, Eupolis, Collected Works 343
   • 460 BCE – 370 BCE, Hippocrates, Prorrhetics 2.1
   • 428 BCE – 347 BCE, Plato, Laws 794E
   • 430 BCE – 354 BCE, Xenophon, On Horsemanship 1.5
   1. (figuratively) maimed, imperfect, defective
      • 428 BCE – 347 BCE, Plato, Phaedo 71E
      • 380 BCE, Plato, The Republic 535D
      • 430 BCE – 354 BCE, Xenophon, Hellenica 3.3.3
      • Hephaestio, Collected Works 5.4
      • 350 BCE – 280 BCE, Demetrius of Phalerum, On Style 301
      • 200 CE – 300 CE, Aristides Quintilianus, On Music 1.25
      • 300 BCE – 200 BCE, Herodas, Collected Works 1.71

Inflection

Derived terms

Descendants

• →⇒? Mingrelian: ქულა (kula, “lame”), ქულაფა (kulapa)

Further reading

• “χωλός”, in Liddell & Scott (1940) A Greek–English Lexicon, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “χωλός”, in Liddell & Scott (1889) An Intermediate Greek–English Lexicon, New York: Harper & Brothers
• “χωλός”, in Autenrieth, Georg (1891) A Homeric Dictionary for Schools and Colleges, New York: Harper and Brothers
• χωλός in Bailly, Anatole (1935) Le Grand Bailly: Dictionnaire grec-français, Paris: Hachette
• χωλός in Cunliffe, Richard J. (1924) A Lexicon of the Homeric Dialect: Expanded Edition, Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, published 1963
• G5560 in Strong, James (1979) Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance to the Bible
• Woodhouse, S. C. (1910) English–Greek Dictionary: A Vocabulary of the Attic Language‎, London: Routledge & Kegan Paul Limited.
  • cripple idem, page 184.
  • crippled idem, page 184.
  • deformed idem, page 205.
  • disabled idem, page 227.
  • halt idem, page 381.
  • impotent idem, page 423.
  • lame idem, page 474.
  • limping idem, page 492.
  • maimed idem, page 508.
• Beekes, Robert S. P. (2010) Etymological Dictionary of Greek (Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series; 10), with the assistance of Lucien van Beek, Leiden, Boston: Brill, →ISBN