by greagach » Sat Sep 06, 2003 6:54 pm
indeed, [face=SPIonic] a)delfo/j [/face] is the general term for "brother". What is written on LSJ obviously refers to the etymology of the word: "having shared the same womb". <br /><br /> If one wants to specify the kind of brotherhood relationship, one would have to use one of the following:<br /><br /> born of the same parents: [face=SPIonic] au)ta/delfoj , a)mfiqalh/j [/face]<br /> sharing only one common parent: [face=SPIonic] <br />e(teroqalh/j , a)llhlopro/gonoj [/face], and more specifically of the same father: [face=SPIonic] <br />o(mopa/trioj [/face], and of the same mother: [face=SPIonic] o(momh/trioj , o(moga/strioj [/face]<br /> <br />and to put it the other way round,<br /> sharing a different father: [face=SPIonic]<br /> a)mfipa/trioj[/face], <br />or a different mother: [face=SPIonic] a)mfimh/trioj , <br />e(teromh/trioj , e(teroga/strioj [/face] <br /><br /> but as if this weren't enough, the Greeks wanted to further insist on brotherhood, having the word [face=SPIonic] o(moga/laktoj [/face], for brothers who, even if they weren't born by the same parent, at least they were breast-fed by the same mother or wet-nurse.<br /><br /> and then, there are words like [face=SPIonic] <br />o(mai/mwn , su/ggonoj [/face]. But thank God, like in most cases, all these synonyms make really good sense in their structure, are easy to pronounce, to analyse and thus to comprehend.
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