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Meanings of the Gods' Names

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Meanings of the Gods' Names Empty Meanings of the Gods' Names

Post  AgathonZante Mon Feb 01, 2016 5:34 pm

Can someone tell me what the names of the Gods mean? For example, I think Haides means "hidden." I would very much like to know the meanings of the names of the Dodekatheon.
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Post  Euthymia Mon Feb 01, 2016 9:15 pm

This is what I could find:

-Zeus: means "Sky Father" (from the proto-indo-european word dieus)
-Hera: means "beloved" (according to Plato) or derives from  "air"
-Poseidon: the origin is uncertain but some scholars infer that it means "Lord" or "Husband"
-Demeter: means "earth mother"
-Artemis: means "great","excellent" or "holy" (all derived from the word "arte")
-Athena: "divine intelligence" or "she who knows many things"
-Aphrodite: "she who lives delicately"
-Apollo: "ever shooting" or "hunter" (although there are many other theories on the origin of the name)
-Hermes: "boundery marker" or "lucky"
-Ares: "battle"
-Dionysos: "he of the tree"
-Hephaistos: unknown origin
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Post  DavidMcCann Tue Feb 02, 2016 3:29 pm

Most Greek gods have names which are quite mysterious: Zeus is the only obvious one. Etymologies given by ancient authors are usually impossible, being examples of popular etymology. An English example of popular etymology is the word "bridegroom", there the lost Old English guma "man" has been replaced by the familiar word groom. Wikipedia (as usual) often has nonsense (like "Da is Doric for "Ge") because they quote every source, good or bad.

> Demeter. Non-Ionic dialect Damater, "mother Da". She goes back to the pre-Greek Minoans.
> Poseidon. Usually taken as "husband of Da".
> Persephone. As Wikipedia suggests, this is a non-Greek name, or rather two with different suffixes. The uncertainty about p or ph is very characteristic of loan words and the -rs- is unusual (Attic -r- is the normal outcome of that).

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