ξυνήιος (Chapter 35)

[strnbrg]

Does ξυνήιος, as in

οὐδέ τί που ἴδμεν ξυνήϊα κείμενα πολλά (verse 124)

have anything to do with the ξυνέηκε in

τίς τ' ἄρ σφωε θεῶν ἔριδι ξυνέηκε μάχεσθαι
(verse 8 ) ?

[Paul Derouda]

ξυνέηκε comes from σύν/ξύν + ἵημι.

σύν/ξύν is certainly the first element in ξυνήϊα, but the rest doesn't look like anything derived from ἵημι. Pulleyn's commentary on book I and (apparently) Chantraine's etymological dictionary both think it's an expanded form of ξυνός "common".

I myself would have thought that -ήιος is the same as in ἤια, "food provision for a journey", as in both words there's the idea of stocking something. But the authorities don't seem to agree with me.

[mwh]

Surely συν/ξυν has nothing to do with it. ξυνηιος (long υ) must be the ionic form of ξυνειος—unattested, to be sure, but clearly equivalent to ξυνός (long υ) = κοινός. Cf. e.g. ξυνήων (Hesiod; Attic ξυνών), ξυνωνίη (Archilochus), etc., all consistently with long υ (and always with ξ, not  σ), whereas the υ in συν/ξυν is never (I think) lengthened.

So I have to disagree with Paul’s “σύν/ξύν is certainly the first element in ξυνήϊα”, and the answer to strnbrg’s question is No, nothing at all.

[Paul Derouda]

Chantraine derives ξυνός from *ξυν-yο-, which would give the long υ (compensatory lengthening or whatever). Or do you find something wrong with that? But you're right to point out the long υ, which I didn't give proper attention - it can't be just σύν/ξύν + something because of the long υ.

[mwh]

If that’s right, it does have something to do with it, but you have to go further back to find it, into the realms of philological speculation. I was simply pointing out the quantitative distinction, which appears to be absolute.
Is Chantraine's postulated glide just a guess (an obvious, even facile one), relying on the semantic similarity, or does it have a proper philological basis? Why should this cluster of words have yod in the first place (and then retain its effect: we don’t find short-υ ξυνός for example), when none of the multitudinous other συν/ξυν- words do? The same question applies if it’s not compensatory but simply metrical lengthening (metrische Dehnung), so why postulate the yod at all?

[Paul Derouda]

Your point about the long υ is taken!

As to the rest, the yod and all that : I dunno.