From: Joao S. Lopes
Message: 37124
Date: 2005-04-12
--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "alex" <alxmoeller@...> wrote:
> so far I remember, the Greek used simply the word Pontos instead of
> Pontos Euxinos and they refered to the Black Sea.
In Homer, Pontos is never the Black Sea (which he ignores). It has
been speculated that the Black Sea was not discovered by the Greeks
before around 700 BC, when the naval technology made it possible to
cross the dangerous understream of the Thracian Bosporus (R.
Carpenter, AJA 52 (1948) 1-10 + Pl; criticism in B. Labaree, AJA 61
(1957) 29-33; A. J. Graham, BICS 5 (1958) 25-42). At any rate, even
if this scenario is too simplistic, the Black Sea seems to have been
more or less terra incognita to the Greeks until the 7th century,
when the first archaeological remains of Greek settlements on the
south and north shore are found.
The name (Pontos) Euxeinos or, in Pindar, Axeinos is normally derived
from the Iranian *axshaina- "black" (cf. W.S. Allen, CQ 41 (1947) 86-
88; R. Schmitt, in: Sprachwissenschaftliche Forschungen, Innsbruck
1985, 409-415; idem, in: Hellas und der griechische Osten,
Saarbrücken 1996, 219-224). If this etymology holds true, it
indicates that the Black Sea was basically an Iranian sea at the
time, when the Greek got acquainted with it (cf. G. Hinge, Herodot
zur skythischen Sprache, in: Glotta [forthcoming], =
http://herodot.georgehinge.com/arimasp.html).
According to the etymological dictionary of Chantraine, the
appellative pontos is "disctinct de pe/lagos parce qu'il est
considéré en principe une voie de passage, d'ailleurs difficile
... le fait typique est qu'en prose comme en poésie le mot s'emploie
pour désigner des mers définies qui servent de voie de passage, cf.
o( Ai)gai=os po/ntos (Hdt., etc.), E(llh/spontos « Hellespont » ...
avec un doublet E(llh/s po/ros."
Even if this evaluation of the primary sense of the appellative
pontos is of course influenced by the accepted etymology *pntH- and
we therefore run the risk of a circulus vitiosus, the actual use of
pontos in the Classical Greek sources seems to support that "road"
was in fact the original meaning of the word.
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