are ἀνύω, ἄνῡμι, ἄνω, ἀνύτω all the same word?

Greek Learning Greek
1

I’ve seen a lot of strange things in AG but this is one that I was not prepared for. One word with four separate verb conjugations in Koine alone, to say nothing of Attic, Homeric and other dialects. Here’s how Cambridge lays it out:

ἀνύω , Att. ἁνύω vb.
impf. ἤνυον , dial. ἄ̄νυον
fut. ἀνύσω
aor.: ἤνυσα , ep. ἤνυσσα , ptcpl. ἀνύσᾱς , ep. ἀνύσσᾱς
pf. ἤνυκα
mid.: ἀνύομαι
aor. ἠνυσάμην , dial. ἀ̄νυσάμᾱν , subj. ἀνύσωμαι
pass.: ep.fut.inf. ἀνύσσεσθαι
aor. ἠνύσθην
pf. ἤνυσμαι
—also ἄνῡμι vb.
dial.impf. ἄ̄νυμες
pass.: 3sg.impf. ἤνυτο ( Od., dub. ) , dial. ἄ̄νυτο
—also ἄνω , ep. ἄ̄νω , Att. ἅνω vb.
3sg.imperatv. ἀνέτω , inf. ἄνειν , ptcpl. ἄνων
impf. ἦνον
mid.: 3sg.opt. ἄνοιτο
pass.: ep. ἄ̄νομαι
3sg.impf. ἤνετο
—also ἀνύτω , Att. ἁνύτω vb.
impf. ἤνυτον
pass.: dial.impf. ἠνυτόμᾱν ( A. )

Then here’s the definition: (it goes on for 14 senses, so i’ll just list 7 senses here so that you get the idea)

1 complete —a journey, a race Od. Theoc. —a task Hes. Sol.
Trag.; (of a god) bring to completion —a task S.Ichn. (dub.) ;
(of construction materials) contribute to completion Th.
|| pass. (of a task) be completed Hom. Hdt.
2 (of a fire) make an end of, consume —a corpse Od. || mid.
spend —a lifetime (w.prep.phr. in a pursuit) Bion
3 endure to the end —one᾽s desire Theoc.
4 accomplish —a plan AR.; (of a god or seer) see through to
completion —their purpose, an announcement Pi. S.
5 (of persons, their efforts) achieve —a death, a good
outcome S. —nothing, little A.fr. Hdt. E. Pl. +; (of considered
words) —a wise result E.; (of a kind of education) —little Pl.
|| mid. (of words) achieve —more X. || pass. (of a goal, a
result) be achieved Plb.
6 perpetrate, commit —a crime S.

2

So for the record, I just want to make sure that what is really going on here, is that these four words, ἀνύω, ἄνῡμι, ἄνω, ἀνύτω, all have the same semantic meanings, but they just have different conjugation patterns.

3

Yes, that’s about right, except they’re not all koine forms (arguably none of them are), and obviously that’s not all that’s “really going on.” They’re all morphologically explicable and there are comparable phenomena with other verbs.

Many other verbs also have both -ω and-μι forms, e.g. δεικνυω/-υμι (the -ω forms tended to supplant the older -μι ones), and ανύτω is just the Attic form of ανύω, which is clearly a by-form of άνω (or rather άνFω w/ digamma, presumably); both appear to be well entrenched already in Homer (all three voices). The basic meaning seems to be something like “fully accomplish,” and there are various derivatives (άνυσις, ανυστός, ανύσιμος, etc.), following regular patterns.

4

Cool, thanks for the info.