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7/29/2019 Palmer, L. R._the Indo-European Origins of Greek Justice_1950_TAPhS, 49, 1, Pp. 149-168
http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/palmer-l-rthe-indo-european-origins-of-greek-justice1950taphs-49-1 1/20
TH E INDO-EUROPEAN ORIGINS OF GREEK JUSTICE
By L. R. PALMER
PERHAPSo word is somuch on th e lips of men to-day, no idea
so potent in remoulding our world, as justice, although to be
sure we express the notion more colloquially by the word
" air " and still more frequently encounter its opposite " not
fair ". This obsession is no t without effect on classical stud ies.
The circumstances of the German occupation of Denmark
provoked the late Professor Prisch's book on "Might andRight in Antiquity ".l Prom Germany has come Professor
Latte's scholarly essay on the '( dea of ;Tustice in Archaic
Greece ' 7 . 2 Mr. Gregory Vlastos has published essays on" Solonian Justice '' and " Equality and Justice in Early
Greek Cosmologies " ,4 a nd a book on the whole subject is
expected from his hand. Remarks on justice are no t absent
from the works of Professor G. Thomson, who writes in his
" Studies in Greek Society " (p . 134) th at the meaning of S t q
is "a path '7. I n this he is echoing Professor J. L. Myres inhis
book '(The Political Ideas of th e Greeks '),which is dom inated
by th e conception of 6 1 ~ 7 s " he way things happen )'. Still
earlier the same conception was expressed by I?. M. Cornford in
" From Religion to Philosophy " (p. 1721, and I find a cautious
restatement in Mr. Guthrie's recent book on '( T h e Greek
Philosophers 7' .5 So we may regard it as a widely accepted
view. B ut in this interpretation of 6 1 q as '' a pa th " we
encounter a point of methodology which is of fundamentalimportance-the place of etymology in such studies of origin.
Hirzel, for instance, in his well-known book on '(Themis,
Dike und Verwandtes ") linked 6 1 ~ q ith ~ L K E ~ V' o throw ",and he traced the word back to the symbolic throwing down
Copenhagen, 1950."Der Rechtsgedanke im archaischen Griechentum," Antike und
Classical Philology 41 (194 6), 66 ff.
Ihid. 42 (1947), 166 ff .
London (Methuen ), 1950,
Abendland, I1 63 ff.
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150 TRANSACTIONS OF TH E PHILOLOGICAL SOCIETY 1950
of th e king’s aicijrrrpov in delivering judgement. I n this he wasfollowed by Dr. V. IChrenberg,l who also suggested t h a t &pis
originally meant a mound or heap, the seat of the oracular
earth-goddess. Professor L att e, on the other hand, regards
the judgement of the king fundam entally as a choice between
conflicting traditions, @pirrrEc ; the 6 1 ~ ~s “ he pronouncc-
ment ”, which originally took the form of a directive, “ das
Weisen einer Richtung ”, I n this way he links up 8 i q with
~ E I K V V ~ L .uch attem pts to penetrate t o the origin of human
ideas and institutions by the analysis of words have a long,
if not always respectable, tradition, going back to ancient
times. Some prevalent doctrines concerning fund am ental
notions of ancient religion, “ dynamism ” for instance, would
seein to have little better foundation than the popular
etymologies of t h e ancient gram marians. It is right, of course,
to appeal to th e evidence of w ords in such m atters, for language
is among the most persistent features of cultural heritage ; it
is the fossilization of pa st though t an d experience. On wordsas th e source of tr u th we m ight quote Socrates in th e P h a d o
99 E : 2So& 8 4 POL XpijvaL E ~ S 06 s hdyovs Kara4vydvra E)v
EIKEIVOLSK O ~ T E ~ VL;v d v r ~ v 7 j vh7jOaav. R ut the str ictest
methodology is required if conclusions drawn from linguistic
evidence are to have an y validity. A word has two aspects :
sound and meaning. It is easy enough to detec t phonetic
resemblances between w ords, b u t t h e semantic side mu st be
established independently by rigorous and objective analysis
of th e contexts in which th e words occur. I n fact, the semantic
leg is by fa r the more important of th e two which support an
etymology. B ut too often it is b ut the shadow of the phonetic
one, for scholars, especially non-philologists, often approach
the contexts they m us t analyse with preconceptions suggested
by accidental phonetic resemblances. Moreover, it is seldom
indeed that a word has a single meaning. Most often (a nd
almost any dictionary article will serve a s a n illustration) we
find that a word exhibits varieties of meaning which existDie Rechtaidee im frllhen Qriechentum 1921 (but Dr. Ehrenberg sub-
sequently moditled his views; see Gnomon V (1929), 4).
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L. R. PALMER-INDO-EUROPEAN ORIGINS OF GREEK JUSTICE 151
contemporaneously, although perhaps the y originated a tdifferent periods. We find what m ay be called a semantic
field. An adequ ate explanation of a word m us t account for all
the components of th e seman tic field in question, wh ich m us t
be considered as a single pattern or structure. Not seldom
philological interpretations are distorted by the arbitrary
selection and over-emphasis of certain constituents of the
semantic field to t he neglect of others. The derivation of G ~ K T
from & K E% is a case in point. The present stu dy ma y claim
innocence of this methodological fault, fo r it is a n accidental
by-product of an investigation which began in what was
apparently a remote field.
In Glotta vol. 19, 5f f , , Max Niedermann noted that a
number of words in Latin and other languages meaning
boundary ” originally m eant rope ”. This paper suggested
a more general investigation into th e sem antic fields of words
denoting (( boundary ”. To-day’s lecture is t he log-book of a
par t of this exploration. We may most usefully begin a t th atpoint where the quest reached th e English word mark. This
goes back t o a n Old English word mearc, for which the meanings
recorded are (‘mark, sign, landmark, boundary ”. I n o ther
Germanic languages the cognates mean ( ( field, ground,
territory ”. The word is cognate with the Latin word margo
and Celtic *mrogi country ”. For our purposes to-day we
should note also t he meanings ‘(mark or characteristic ” and
mark in th e sense of (‘ im, goal, or target ”, what I shall refer
to as the marksmanship ” part of the semantic field. Inthis sphere the word can denote th e post or other objec t placed
to indicate the terminal point of a race. The word mark
enters, further, into words of “pointing out ”, ( ( indicating ”,‘( emarking ”, ‘( emerken ”, etc. (For further details see
NED, an d for th e G ermanic relatives Falk-Torp 312.l)For another limit or boundary word we may draw on Latin,
where the word modzcs has some interesting relatives. The
There would appear to be no compelling grounds to follow Falk-Torpin positing two separate Germanic word-families (1) mark, mark0 ‘ Grenze,Grenxland ’ and (2 ) marlea, marlco ‘Zeichen, Kennzeichen ’,
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152 TRANSACTIONS OF THE PHILOLOCIICAL SOCIETY 1950
meaning “ imit ” is apparent in expressions such as Jinern etd u r n ramire, in the derivatives modero and modestus and
in the adverbial mod0 meaning “merely, only ”. The pre-
dom inant meaning in L atin is, of course, “ measure.” But it is
in th e Italic dialects th a t we find th e most interesting develop-
ments. I n Umbrian the word w d s is equivalent to the Latin
i u s , while in Oscan mn,eddiss is equivalent to iudex ; an Oscan
magistrate is recorded by Livy as the wceddix tuticus. This
legal use of th e cognates of modus is found also in Irish, where
m,idiur bears the meaning “ I judge ” and mess = “ udge-
ment ”. On the other hand, Welsh shows another divergent
in medd = “h e says ”, In Germanic, too (Palk-Torp 304 f , ) ,
we find the meanings ( Lmeasure, mode, or manner.” Most
interesting for our purposes are derivatives meaning ‘( ate,
what is meted out,” e.g. OE rnetod.
Now we are back in Germanic again t he G erman word Maldeserves our attention . W ith a primary meaning ‘‘ spot or
mark ”, it is recorded by G r i m i n t he aenses “ boundarymark ’’ (beide gerichte . . . sollen nach ihren altelz mahlen und
grenzen . . .gescheiden sein ; besqtes pfarrguth in stein und
rein, ziehlen und mahden halten) ; this is also applied to
temporal relations, ‘‘ point or limit of time,” a s exemplified in
such compounds as einmal, zweimal, etc. ; “ aim or goal,”
especially in combination with Ziel (e.g. sie setzen das mahl
und ziel a% einem berg) ; “ mark or designation, monument.”
The Germanic cognates show a similar range of meaning. Our
own word meal goes back t o OE rnB1 “ mark, sign ; measure ;
fixed time ;meal ” ; Swedish ma1 ‘‘mark ; goal, aim, purpose ;
m easu re; m eal; court cas e” (note th e juridical com-
ponent of the field, cf. rnidiur, rneddix, above ; the temporal
application, too, is paralleled by the Latin adverb modo).
This Germanic noun *m i la is linked up with other nominal
forms, such as OE ma$ measure, Gk. ~ ~ T L s - ,kt. mGti!t
‘‘measure ”, all from IE “m&, from which La tin rnEtior is
derived (Meillet-Ernout 681). The Slavonio cognates, inparticular, are worth attention. Trautm ann (p. 183) lists
m,eta- I‘ time, year ” (e.g. Lithu anian rngtas) and distinguishes
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L . R. PALMER-INDO-EUROPEAN ORIGINS O F GREEK JUSTICE 153
it from meta- (I hrow ” (bu t note th at in Russian meta means‘( arget, aim, object ” and wetiti “ mark, aim a t ”, etc. The
verb met6 “ hrow ” (Lithuanian mhsti, OCS mesti, etc.)
Trautmann links up with words for “measure” such as
Lithuanian m%tas, matboti. Here, too, th en in Balto-Slavonic
we find a similar semantic constellation : “mark,” (‘ ime-
limit,” ‘(measure,” ‘( hrow.” A cognate is found in the
Albanian mot (‘ ear ” from ;>mi!to)n d in view of th e numerous
semantic parallels it would now be difficult to exclude the
Latin mzta “ goal, turnin g po int ”.If we now turn to Greek, a glance at the article Gpos in
Liddell & Sco tt reveals the following pa tte rn : “ boundary,”
‘‘ landmark ” (this is used also in a temporal sense “ nterval ”)
magistrate’s decision,” (‘mem orial stone or pillar ”( cf. M a l ) ,“ standard or measure.” In OCS 0“pos is translated by rolcii,
a word belonging to a Balto-Slavonic group of noteworthy
semantic scatter : S.-Cr. rdk “ ime-limit ”, Pol. rok “ year ”,
Ru. POX : “year, time-limit, fate ”. Trautmann (p. 243) linksthese words up with rek6 “ say ” (e.g. OCS reSti c t m i v ) .
B ut before proceeding further it will clarify our minds for
the attack on the central problem of this paper if I plot the
possible sem antic ramifications of these I‘boundary ” words.
Mark
‘ 6
indication ; point o ut, say.
characteristic.
aim , goal, winning post ; throw.
(of space) limit ; measure ; erritory.
(of time) opportune mo men t, appointed time, season, year.
(metapho rical) dividing line, decision, judgem ent.
shape, form, mode, manner.
Boundary mark
Outline
We still seem remote from the “ Indo-European Origins of
Greek Justice ”, andI
mu st confess th at a t this point of theinquiry I had no notion where it would lead me. B u t the word
Ma1 has a cogQate in Gothic md, and this word is used in
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154 TRANSACTIONS OF THE PHILOLOGICAL SOCIETY 1950
Mark i. 15 to translate the Greek word Ka ipds in th e phrasex m h r j p w r a c d Kaipds. At this point we break throughinto
the familiar an d congenial surroundings of th e classical world,
which we shall not leave again until towards the end of this
paper.
The equivalence of Ma1 and Kacpds prompts us to look ah
the G reek word more closely. We detect a t once two prom inent
features of the sem antic field we ar e exploring, for “measure ”and ‘‘ ime limit ”, ‘‘ opportune moment ”, are among the
most farniliar meanings of Kaipds. But these occupy the
fringes of th e field. W ha t of th e more focal meanings “ mark ”or “ boundary mark ” ? Ev ery Greek scholar will immediately
recall two passages in the Agarnemnon of Aeschyliis.
Ala ro c &&ov pkyav atSoijpai
r d v rd8a npol.$aw’ an’ ’Ak&iv8pq>
rdvov ra xdXa6 ~ d f o v , 6 x 0 ~ s lv
prjw np d KaLpoC p76’ Sx$p d o r p w v
p h o s 7jxielov uKrj+lEV 3G5 ff.
‘‘ I honour mighty Zeus, the watcher over host and guest,
who has done this work, long stretching his bow against
Alexander tha t neither short of the mark nor beyond th e stars
he migh t shoot his bolt t o no purpose.”
For the expression xpd K a i p o C , “short of the mark,”
Thomson compares Euripides Suppl. 744: J KaipoO x i p a
r d rd.$ov ~ V ~ E ~ O V ~ E S .
The use of Kaipds for “hi t t ing the mark” in speech i s
frequent in Sophocles : xp d s Ka c p d v EIvulneiv Trach. 59 ;
/IXE‘x’ €2 Kaipia q W y y g Phil. 862 ; E L 62 p4 7 6 n p d s uaipdv
X y w v KVPB , &ravpaL Phil. 1279 ; o; 61 d&iav &7jv roTs
2paG X d y o ~ s&80& , E L prj T L KaLpoG rvypivvw, p&ippooov
El. 29f. B ut it is Aeschylus who makes the “shooting ”metaphor most explicit :K a t yhBooa ro.$&aua p$ rdL ualpca . . .Suppl. 446 (cf. ualpLa X i yw Septem 1). N o h , too, t h a t a
blow ( n h q y + ) which is Kaipia is one which h its the mark.These examples of “mark or aim ” will perhaps suffice to
establish this constituent of th e semantic field of Kacpds and
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L. R. PALMER-INDO-EUROPEAN ORIGINS OF GREEK JUSTICE 155
we may now be encouraged to look for the sense “ boundarymark, limit, dividing line ”. This I find clearly in tw o passages
of Euripides. In Hippolytus 385 ff., Phaedra, speaking ofa/6&, says tha t there are two kinds :-
Giuual 6’ ~ t u l v , p2v 06 K a w j
4 6’ 6 x 8 0 s O ~ K W V . E L 6’ d Kaipds $v aa$+
O ~ Kv 6v’ i j a r q v ra&’ ZxovrE ypbppara .
“if the dividing line were plain (ie. if there were a clear
de jn i t i on ) there would not be two having the same name ”.The meaning of “limit ”, (‘definition ”, appears also in
Phosnissne 469 ff . Polyneices pleads his cause a nd begins :-
&XO~% 0’ p a h rijs 6 X q 0 d a s EY$u
KOZ ; n-oitciXWv 8 ~ i6v6 ix ’ <ppqvEvpdrwv .
Z X E L y d p a&& icaipdv.
“ Ju st things (note <v&Ka, to w hich we shall retu rn later) do
not need sub tle expositions. For they have Kaipds,” i.e. “ hey
are clearly dejned.”How aware th e Greek was of this fund amen tal meaning of
ua ipds a s “ he limit ” is shown by a phrase of P inda r in the
first Pythian. The point Pindar is making is : “ do n ot praise
too much, otherwise you wilI sicken the hearer, who is soon
surfeited b y ano ther man’s praises.” The poet expresses th is
by saying Kaipdv e l @+faio “ f you limit your utterance ”,an d then he m akes explicit his conception of tcaipds by adding
the phrase : noh XB v n el p ar a av vra vd ua is E)v /3paXcT “ pulling
the boundary ropes together in a brief space” (for m i p a p ,
ano ther boundary w ord, see below). This insistence on th e
proper limit even of praise recurs in Pinda r : in the 10 th
Pythian, for instance, r1 ~opn-bw -apd Kaipdv . . . , where it
would be rendered more appropriately as “ why do I boast
beyond th e p roper limit, imm oderately ”, rather than as “ o u t
of season ”. Democritus, too, in his insistence on the proper
limits rings the changes on Kaipds, p&pov, and 6pos :-
46oval a“Kaipo6 &-ouuiv &76las f r . 7 1 ; n a i l i d s O ~ K
6 v 8 p k r13& p h p w s i?ri8vpriv fr. 70 ; xp 7p dr w v o“prfcs, 4v 1.4dp lcy ra i ~ d p y , d y s &axdrys ~ o h h d v xahen-wrkpy f r . 219 ;
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1% TRANSACTIONS O F TH E PHILOLOGICAL SOCIETY 1950
and a similar variation is apparent in the 4rro#&ypara of theSeven Sages : p h p o v gprurov is attributed to Cleoboulus,
p~62v yav t o Solon, p & p y x p B to Thales, an d Karpdv yvB9i
to Pittacus.
This close association of Kaipdc, pgrpov, Gpos, etc., is seen
in yet another pre-Bocratic, Anarxarchos : nohvpa el7
Kcipra p & Bqkhc;, Kcipra i 3 h c i r r E r r d v 2 p v r a . B+eh~- i
pZv r6v 6cfrdv d d p a , flhcinr~r62 rd v tjyi‘61ws (bwvECvv7a
n8v %nos K+ navrl 8rjpy. x p ; 7 62 Kaipov” p& pa el6 iva i.
o o # lys y i p o171-o~pas. fr. 1.
We may compare further the exchanges of the chorus (the
distribution of the lines is disputed) in the exodus of
Aeschylus Supplices 1059 f.
A. p&piov vCv Znos ~ 6 x 0 ~ 1use moderation in your
B. &a tcalpdv ~ U E C ~ ~ U K E L S“what limit do you enjoin
C. r& 9eGv p y S & C&<E~V “ do not be excessive in your
This usage is so widespread that I need do 110 more than
quote the familiar proverb : p l r p a +vhcioadai* Kaipds 6’
E)d ~ 6 i o i v ?p~orosHesiod W D 694, of. pq62v Zyav amv’6eiv.
KarpAs 6’ 2nl T ~ U L V pimas Theogn. 401 f . lWe have now established for the semantic field of Kabpds
most of the fundamental components of Ma1 and the rest.2
But in pursuing this study I was struck by the number oftimes in which Karpds was coupled with 6 1 ~ ~ .heognis, fo r
On ~ a i p d s ee Wilamowitz Kleine 8chifterh 1. 43 ff.
prayers ”.
on me 1 ”demands on the gods”.
a With the etymology of Kaipds we are not here ooneerncd, but n possiblesolution is suggested by t h e number of boundary words which arc derivrtl
from word8 meaning “ cut, Rplit ”. Trautmann (130) quotes under kert6
an d k i d 6 ‘ schneide, sohlagc ’ skr. Eita ‘ Link ’, ru . herti ‘ Strich, Linie,
Grenze ’ with the temporal sense MuZ in li . ku7taa and le. - h r t , while le.
kdrtu has the meanings ‘ Reihe, Schicht ; Ordnung, Stand ; Weise Art ’.(Cf. Sanskrit dakf t “once”.) Under snad Falk-Torp 52 0 quotes mnd.
snit (Linie), ‘Grenze, Grenzzeichen’ and again (p. 522) under anaid6
mnd. e d e ‘Grenzlinie ’ ; under 8keZ (p. 468) mnd. dchele ‘ Unter-
schied Mangel, Grenze ’, All this strongly supports a connection withK c i p (see J. B. Hofmann, Etymobgidches Wbuterbuch drs GriechiacAen).
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L . R. PALMPR-INDO-EUROPEAN ORIGINS OF GREEK JUSTICE 157
instance, writes : € 2 6' G X K W S nap& K a L p d v & v 3 p + I o ~ d p S ~ i 'OupG KT<UETUL 1. 199. In Aeschylus again, S i K a l w s is used
as th e opposite of C ~ K U ~ ~ W S-
yvc;uy 6: x p d v y 8 L a r r E U O d p E V O S
TdV TE 8LKUiWS K a l TdV Cik-alpos
T d h L V Ol KO Vp Of iV TU %OhLT&V
Agamemnon 807 R.
With this we may compare Clmphoroe 624 ff., where, as
Headlam points out , '' th e OZ ;K E ) V ~ ~ K W S of 1. 636 is synonymouswith the &alpus of 1. 622 ". A similar equivalence is found
in two lines of the Proinetheus V'inctus :--
p p O T O k T L TLp&S ;TUUUS T d p U 6 1 K T S 1. 30
cf. p< vuv /3por06s p2v &#AEL K U L ~ O C rlpa 1. 507.
Similar, too, is Hesiod's use of m p a K a l p L a in W D 329, where
he speaks of the man who mounts his brother's bed, a secret
adulterer, as napaicalpba ; E ' <WV . Liddell & Scott translates
this passage as " unseasonable, ill-timed ", but Hesiod hardly
seems to be rebuking t he timing of thi s deed. I n fact he sums
up these r r a p a K a l p i a Zpya as Zpya ~ " ~ L K U1. 334). It is this
close association of K a i p d s and 6 1 ~ 7 hich finally brings us
by a circuitous an d unp remeditated route to t h e problem
suggested by the title of this lecture.
I n view of th e meanings of K a L p d s which we have established
the thought irresistibly obtrudes itself that 6 1 ~ 7 ay have a
similar origin. We recall immediately t h a t 6 1 ~ ~s a derivativefrom the root "deild, to which it bears the same relationship
as 4uy . j t o 4 ~ t y . lThere is little doubt about the basic meaning of this root
*deik, which is exemplified in the verb G E ~ K V V ~ L' I show,
point out ". The root is widespread in inany languages : for
instance t h e German word Zeichen = " sign, ma rk '' is cognatc
with our token. I n L ati n, too, th e original significance " how,
point out " is present in such derivatives as index, indieare.
The most com mon sense of th e verb dTco is, of course, the
Scc Scliwyzer Griech. Cram. 1469.
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158 TRANSACTIONS OF THE PHILOLOGICAL SOCIETY 1950
secondary one, (‘ o say,” a development fo r which we haveseen m any para1lels.l B u t the original significance ( ‘ o point
ou t ”, is present in such phrases as iis istarvb viarib &GO.
Examples from man y languages show th a t th e semantic field
of this root bears a striking resemblance to that of modus,
rmrk, and t he rest.2 Bu t we should note th at Greek shows no
trace of the development ‘( o say ”,3 and 80 6 1 ~ 7cannot
mean pronouncement ” of th e judge. Greek is faithful t o the
primary significance of the root ‘(mark, indicate ”, and so we
m us t postulate for 6 1 ~ 7he primary significance (‘mark ” or
( ( indication ”. But this turns out to be no mere hypothesis,
for this is the m eaning w hich the word actually bears in many
of the earliest attested contexts. I am thinking of such
passages as Odyssey 19. 43, where Telemachus marvels a t th e
mysterious light which makes th e megaron blaze like fire an d
his father silences him an d says: ( ( this is th e 6 1 ~ 7f the Gods ”.I n other words (‘ his is the mark or sign, th e characteristic of
the gods ”. There are a iiurriber of such passages where ~ L K Vis used for the mark or characteristic, e.g of gods, old men,
1 Cf. Balto-Slavonic *rEditei‘ (Mi. rcidyti ‘‘ aeigen ”, etc.) cognatc with
Gothic rddjun ‘‘ rcden, sprechen ” a n d Oh. oruidiu ’‘ spreclie ” (Trau tmann
Y35, who quotm as a semantic parallel Runs. ukuzutt). Cf. further Lith.
sukyti ‘‘ say ” but OCS sotiti ‘ ndicare ’ (Trau tmann 255).
For details see J. Gonda’s exhaustive study d d ~ ~ v p i ,msterdam,1929. 1 have not been convinced by this author’s attem pt t o show th at th o
primary meaning of *deik was “ ichten ” an d still less by his suggestion t h a t
the root *dik meant“
plaa ts ( in cen r ichting) ”. In th i s paper I havu
followed the advice of Pr ar u Skutsch, who once said th a t Lat in etymologiea
must be sought on the Tiber. Thu s I have here been primarily concerned
to plot semantic fields as they are revealed in actual contexts. In this wayI rccord, for instance, the semantic scatte r of Slcvonic word^ deriving from
wki) a nd *rok&, b u t I have ruled out such speculations as t h a t reko oontairin
the Indo-European root *wer “ s~ay . Faithful adherence to the samc
prinaiple also excludes th e assu mp tion of the semantic development “ say ”for BCLK - in Greek. ~ L K ? munt be understood from the position it occupienin the semantic field discloscd by the s tudy of Greek conte xts, Still less
do I believe that we can postulate *de ik “ say ” fo r IE, but concur with
Walde-Hofmann p. 349 : “ doch ist die im Lat. und z.T. im Germ. , . ,vertretene Bedeutung sagen ’ jedenfalls aus ‘ zeigen m it W orten, hin-
weisen ’ entwickelt.”
ThiR iri methodologically an impor tan t point.
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L. R. PALMER -INDO-EUROPEAN ORIGINS OF GREEK JUSTICE 159
slaves, and so on, to behave in such and such a way (e.g.Odyssey 4 , 691, 14, 59 , 24, 255, etc.). It is this usage which
survived in the adverbial accusative in such phrases as K V V ~ S
X K Y V ,which may be translated into Latin as canis rnodo-
yet another link with “ imit ” words.
Our familiarity with the semantic fields of such ‘(mark-
words” now provokes the question whether 6 1 ~ 7 ad the
meaning (‘ oundary or limit ”. The idioms used in many
passages in early Greek literature from H om er onwards suggest
such ail interpretation of 6 1 ~ 7 . In Hesiod, for instance,
W D 36 ff., we read : u’hh’ a$& GLaKpivwpeBa V E ~ K O S B e l y n
S l ~ p an d again Theognis 85 : 6LaKplvovra B6pLuras
l O e l p G l ~ p dividing, separating the O + LM E S with
straight GlKaL ”, a phrase which echoes Homer’s U K O X L ~ S
K ~ ~ V W U L+u7as Iliad 16 , 387. This theme of straightness
and crookedness is inseparable from 81KaL. It is extremely
frequent in Hesiod, an d we find it in Homer :
e.g. r$ 8 6 p ~ v&- P E T& T O ~ LOdvraTa ~ ’ l n o ~ .
Iliad 18, 508.
e l 6’ Ly’ 2yAv a6r& B L K ~ U W ,Kal p’ oi; T L V ~ $qp~
a ”Mov E ‘ Z - L ~ ~ < & L V AavaGv. &ia ydp &nab
Iliad 23,579 f .
soion : EdeI;VEL2 xKasK o ~ L i i s y . P . 37.
Piiidar : E ~ ; O VVE haois 61Kas Pyth. 4. 153, and eluewhere.
The truly just man is ~ O V ~ ~ K ~ S .t was th e analysis of suchpassages which led Professor Latte to his conclusion : (‘Das
Urteil wird also als das Aufzeigen einer Linie gefasst, in der
sich richtiges V erhalten zu bewegenhat ‘’ (Zoc. cit., p. 15). This
underlying notion of a judgement as the drawing of a line is
rriade particularly explicit by Theognis, who writes, 453 ff. :-
XpG p~ nap& ur60prp K a l yvdpova T+SE BlKaauaL,
Kdpvr, 6 l ~ q v .
(‘ m ust decide this 6 1 ~ ~y carpenter’s line and se t square.”Among these contexts, too, we observe an instructive sub-
stitution of Karpo ’s fo r ~ I K V-
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160 TRANSACTIONS OF TH E PIKILOLOGICALSOCIETY 1950
o"6r ycip aoA6 K a l noA@ &%rr~dp@ 6iaKpivEw $pev l p$ r a p & K a i p A v
6vcr.rraACs.
Pindar 01. 8. 23 f.
B u t G l q keeps still other verbal company w hich betray s its
origins. I n Hesiod TVD 239 f. we read :-
o ts 6' CPpis T E pipqhe ,a,+ K a l oX&Aia 2 p y a
r o i s 82 6 1 ~ 7 ) ~pov lSqs rwpa lpEraL cz l rpdona Zeds.
It is a derivative from -&pap
meaning " a fixed mark, boundary, goal, aim, end" (see
Liddell & Scott 7 . 1 Here then Zeus " marks ou t the 6 1 ~ ~.B ut while we are dealing with r ftcpctlpopac it will suit our
purposes later in this lecture if I point out another passage,
where Hesiod rebukes his brother with the words :-
What is racpaIpraL Z
t ' p y q e v V + r l € m p u r
Epya r&.r' d v O p i n o m i &ol 6 L a r w p 7 j p a v r o
WD 398" h e works which th e gods marked out, assigned to, allocated
to, men."
It is such passages wJiich form the natural transition to th e
sense " allotted portion, rightful portion, lot, fa te ",which 8 1 ~ q
also bears in Homer. For instance, in bringing about th e
reconciliation between Agamemnon and Achilles Odysseus
says :-
a6rc ip &rctrci uc 6 a m l t ' v i ~ X i a l z s Epcu&aOwrrwip;?, Zva 1.4 T L Gl rcqs E'.rriGrv& E"Xgu6a.
' A r p c i " 6 7 , u6 6' E".rreLra SLKaidrcpos K a l &r' ZXAy
Zuueac.
i i iaa 1 9 , 1 7 9 i ~ .
I' B ut thereafter let him m ake amends to you i n his hu t with
a rich feast, th a t you m ay have nothing lacking of your S ~ K ' I ) .
And you, Atreides, hereafter shall be more Glrcaios towards
another man." Here the adjective Glrcaios is used of one
For &pap in the wnso of r6Aos ae0 Pindar Pyth. 2. 40 : Oe6s &av i d
2 A ~ i S r a a ~pap dv6masar.
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L. R. PALMER-INDO-EUROPEAN ORIGINS OF CREEK JUSTICE 161
who observes propriety in the matter of rightful portions, a
sense which is clearly apparen t also in Od. 20, 293 f. :-
p o i p a v p i v 64 ( E ~ V O S + E L miXai &s E ) ~ ~ O ~ K E Y
Ibgv.
&‘Ecvovs.
0; ycip tcahdv ~T+LV 0682 GlKaLov
Thc meaning “ lot, fa te ”, is ap pa ren t also in Od. 19, 167.
ij’ p t v p’ dXkcoai Y E ~ & U E K
6 y & p 6 1 q , o “ n n o r ~ r p r l shr loaiv i EXopai.
$s &nkyu1 2v<p 76orTov xpdvov o“ouov +A v5v.“ Truly you will endow me with more woes than I am now
possessed of. This is a man’s lot when he is absent from his
homeland a s long as I.”
So far o ur hypothesis has accounted for most of th e usages of
6 1 ~ g nd t he peculiar idioms in which it is set. There remains
the verb 8 i K E b , which acts as the aorist of / 3 & h h ~ i v t o
throw ”. Hirzel and Ehrenberg regarded this meaning
as focal and were thus led to their interpretation of 61~7as fundamentally the throwing down of the a t c j j n ~ p o v
in a symbolical act of judgement. B ut from our present
vantage point of com parative semantics the semantic patte rn
appears in a different an d simpler light. 6lKE’iV “ o throw ”is merely the surviving representative of that part of the
semantic field which we have labelled “ marksmanship ”,examples of which have been quo ted previous1y.l
Thus far the analysis of th e idioms an d contexts in which
8 1 ~ 7 ccurs has strengthened its evident etymological con-nection with th e root *&& = m ark , point, show ”. Its semantic
ramifications have beeii paralleled by numerous examples from
other I-E. languages. B ut such parallels would not themselves
justify the conclusion indicated in the title which this lecture
bears. The evidence so far adduced would not necessarily
imply th a t t he Greeks derived this peculiar concept of justice
1 Perhaps the best example is the Balto-Slavonia *&a- (Trautmnnn74 ) :
“aksl. go&, ~ ~ i p d r ,pa, Rkr. y15d ‘‘ Besttag ”,L ‘ J ah r ” : ru . god “ Jahr,
Zeit ”. 6 . hodim, hoditi ‘‘ wcrfcn ” ; u. dial. gob, gotlit6 “ aogern, warten,
zielen ”.PIIILO. TRANS. 1950. M
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162 TRANSACTIONS OF THE PIIILOLOGICAL SOCIETY 1950
and judgement as the respect for certain limits from thepare nt Indo-E uropean. The sema ntic developments “ mark ”,“ boundary mark ”, ‘‘ judicial decision ”, and the rest might
be considered so natural as to have taken place iiidependently
and so not justify any conclusions about a common I-E.
origin of this conception of justice.
To proceed furthe r, 1 must introduce a new notion-that of
fiemantic structures. This notion of structure h as been applied
b y Professor DumBzil in his long sustained efforts to pen etrate
the secrets of Indo -European religion. Qu ite simply tlic
principle is this : an isolated fact, say, of Roman religion,
which is fouiitl t o resemble one of H indu religion, would no t b y
itself be of any great interest or significance to the com-
paratist. B ut if a group of religious concepts is found t o have
a definite structure and this strueture, with complex inter-
relations of it s component features recurs elmwhere, then th e
likelihood of a purely accidental resemblance becomes pro-
gressively less the m ore peculiar an d complex tthe stnructure s.It is this notion of structure th at I now propose to apply to
the seman tic problem with w hich we are dealing to-day.
S I K ~ , e have seen, is a mark and inore specifically a
boundary inark. But so fundamental a word of the moral
vocabulary is no t isolated. I t impliesa peculiar Weltmi,schauu~,q
which must reveal itself in othe r expressions dealing with the
same sphere of ideas. If this notion of Ltoundttry or limit is
focal, then we should expect to find th at other t e rms for moral
ideas harmonize with it. I n wha t remains of this paper, I shall
try to deinonstrate that such a &xucture, such a harm ony ,
exists in Greek ; and , further, th at i t occurs elsewhere in the
111: world in so peculiar a form that it justifies a conclusioii
ab ou t Indo-Ruropean origins.
I n the first place we note th at the just ma n is < V ~ L K O S ,
quite literally he remains “ within his marks or limits ”;
unlike his opposite, who is E K ~ L K O S . B ut w hat are these limits ?
They are the limits of his proper portion or allotment, his po+aor a h . The systeni of mu tually determining ,uoipaL is thus
cxpressed by Aeschylus :-
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L. R. YALMER-INDO-EUROPEAN ORIGINS OJ?GREEK JUSTICE 163
E L 82 p$ r m a y p l v a
po ipa po ipav ZK OeGv
dpy E prj T M O V 4 E I P E L V .
Agamemnon 1025 R.
A.Y for the synonym a b a , we find that a h p a Zpya are
synonymous with 6 l q in Odyssey 14. 84, while the com-
pounds E'valaLpos and E'(aluLos parallel & ~ L K O S and ; ; C ~ LKOS
(e.g. A h a . . . r d v 6' E'valaipov ria, Aeschylus Ag. 775).
Another such pair is Zvvopos a i d ZKVO~OS , .g. &as 06
rvyxcivovaiv E'vvdpov Aeschylus Suppl. 384. B ut wh at of the
ac t by which a man passes from one sta te t o the other ? As many
scholars have pointed out, it is an act of " stepping over "," respass ", '( ransgression ", 6nepj laola (cf. p 6 h c - r ~ o h
~ L X E L ,d A ~ r ' .E'ml r h p a aepGu' 0 1 6 ~ 4 . Sophocles Oed. Col.
883 ff.). Perhaps the best-known expression of this view of
the universe where each element has its appointed portion
and limits is Heraclitus fr. 94 +LOS y& p 03x d m p j l i u e r a ip&rpa* EL 62 prj ' E ~ L v ~ E s ,lurp inluovpoi, E)&vp'l juovaw.
The same conception is fundamental in the cosmology of
Anaximander :-&$ 6 v 82 $ y k v ~ u l s2urL roTs O ~ U L ,ual r $ v
40opdv E ~ S racra ylveo0ai K u r d r d X P E & V * 616ovaL y&p
a;& G i q v ual rluiv &hh?jho i~jjs L6iulas uar6 r$v roc
xpdvov rd f i v . fr. 2.
Over this universal system of allocations a nd proper portions
there broods a jealous, watchful spirit which punishes trespasses
an d encroachments. This is Nemesis, '' distribution" or " dis-tributor ", for the origin of this te rm is quite transparent. It is
the action noun from v l p m = The part
played by Nemesis in the distribution of po ipa i i8 made
explicit by Pindar :-
dxopai &p#~lKahGv polpq N6pEuiv GiXdjlovXov p+j
I distribute ".
B&€V.
01. 8. 86.
and pozpav v+mv is a frequently occurring idiom (e.g.
Aeschylus PV 294, Sophocles Trach. 163, 1238, etc.).
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164 TRANSACTIONS OF THE PHILOLOGICAL SOCIETY 1950
T ha t Greek cosmological, political, a nd moral thinking wasdominated by this notion of appointed portions and proper
limits is n fact so familiar arid so often discussed th at I need
do no more than refer to the late Professor F. M. Cornford's
luminous pages of analysis in the early chapters of From
Religion to Philosophy : " th e fTalnewOrk of prim itive re ligious
representation ia Greek is a system of departments (moirai)
clearly marked off from one another b y boundaries of inviolable
taboo, an d each (department,) th e seat of a potency w hich
pervades that department, dispenses its power with it and
resists encroachments from without ') (p. 38). And again :
"i t is necessary to grasp that Nomos does not suggest
uniformity of temporal sequence, hu t exercise of power, within
spatial or departm ental boundaries. We must think of Law
as a dispensation or system of provinces within which all the
activities of a comm unity are parcelled oiit an d co-ordinated )'
(p. 30). B ut perhaps the clearest expression of this connection
of law and justice with boundaries of provinces is to be foundin words given by Sophocles to Antigonc :--
066' $ r$&VOlKOS 7 & V K a ' T W %€&V A ~ K V
r o l o w 6 ' av Cl'v%pd.rro1s p l a € v v d p o v s .
Antigone 461 f.
" It was not Justice who dwells with the nether gods who
marked out the boundaries of such vdpo~.)'
We may now tu rn to Dr. J. T. Sheppard's discussion of this
set of ideas in the introductory essay to his edition ofthe Oedipus Tyrannus. Particularly relevant to us a t t he
moment are his remarks on the Partheneion of Alkman.
I quote : " The girls for whom Alcman made his Partheneion
have been singing of the wicked ambition and the ruin of
certain heroes, who aspired to marriage with the imniortals.
For excess in matters of Aphrodite and the desire to makc
great marriages are among the many forms assumed by the
tendency of mortal men to thoughts th at are above mortality.This is how they moralize this story before they turn to
lighter themes.
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L . R. PALMER-INDO-EUROPEAN ORIGINS OF GREEK JUSTlCE 166
( The gods avenge and h appy hewho weaves in cheerful piety
his day without a tear.' "2arL TLS orGv r h s .
6tdpp.v GLanX&cri
a "KXa v r 0 s .
0" 6' 6 h a L O S , &TlS Ev"4pWV
We firid ourselves at that poiiit of the ode where iiiyth
crystallizes into maxim, a maxim which takes the form-" Seek no t t o wed Aphrodite-aspire not t o heaven ". But the
m yth concludes jus t before th e maxim with the baffling lines :--
KP$T~ JUE y& p A b a navrGv
KaZ n d p o s yEpaLrClToi
ai Gv.Who are Aisa and Poros, the oldest of the gods, whose inter-
vention is provoked hy such attempts to overstep man's
proper h i t s 1 For Aisa the case is clear enough ; but who or
what is Poros '1 The context an d its linking with Aisa suggests
th at i ts meaning is " apportionment ". It is th e noun from th e
root *per which we find in &pas '( he limit ", etc., in th e root
aorist ~ O P E T V ,while the perfect passive participle r d n m p w p & o v
is yet another Greek word for "fate, destiny, the allotted
portion ".I In this phrase ('Part and Apport ionment , the
oldest of the gods " we have the mythological expression for
that primal dasmos or act of distribution which Cornford
postulated as prior t o th e emergence of th e Olympian dynastyin the world. B u t peculiar as it is, this conception is no t
unparalleled and here perhaps the cornparatist may again
render a service.
Among the Indo-Iranian peoples we also find that '' in the
physical world there rules a regular order Rta . . . which is
clearly an inheritance from the Indo-Iranian period "(Berriedale Ke ith, Religion and Philosophy of the Veda, p. 83).
R ta is also ( ' onceived as a firm an d abiding principle residing
Note, too, tha t n e i p a p besides meaning ' imits ' can also mean ' judiciel
decision' : Q+w 6' i k u 0 ~ vin; hropt ~ ~ i p a p"Arut9aiIliad 18. 500. SeeG. Bjorck, Mdlanges Boisacq I 144.
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166 TRANSACTIONS OF THE PHILOLOGICAL SOCIETY 1950
in man ” (p. 247). But how amoral this conception is we maygather from the fact that ‘I the Dawns arise in the morning
according to the &a, the Fathers have placed the sun in the
heavcn according to the Rta ” (p. 83). Professor Keith tells us
further that “ no great stress is laid on the moral quality of
the gods and the sense of sin is only very feebly represented
in the hymns and the moral aspect of the Rigveda is practically
confined to the case of the Varuga, the Adityas, and Aditi
herself” (p. 244).
Now, in his book Servius et la Fortune, Professor G. Dumhzil
has examined some of the myth8 relating t,o a primordial act of
distribution which produced the order of the universe and
society as the ancient Hindus saw it. Concerned in this dis-
tribution Professor Dumezil finds the pair of Adityas, Arilqa
and Bhaga, literally “ portion ” and “ distribution ” or
“ distributor ”. This is precisely Alkman’s Aisa and Poros.
But let us concentrate for the moment on Bhaga ‘(distribu-
tion ” or “ distributor ”. T t is the name of a divinity, anhditya from whom welfare is expected. It also means
“ portion ”, ‘‘ lot ”, or “ fortune ”. Rut a derived verb
bhalcpti means = ‘ eats, devours, consumes”. On the other
hand, in Old Persian Rug@has become generalized and means
‘‘ god ”, and this word has found its way into the Slavonic
languages. We have here a peculiar semantic structure :
(1) divide, apportion, (2) feast, (3) god, especially as the
bestower of wealth. Does this recall nothing in Greek ? Have
we not GalopaL = “ distribute, divide ” with the nounSaupds, which figures in e number of significant contexts dis-
cussed by Professor Cornford P This same root figures again
in a set of words denoting “ feast, banquet ”, e .g . Sat?, S a l v v p ,
SaLTpdv, etc. But, most remarkable of all, it forms the basis of
the most general Greek word for a supernatural being-Salpwv.
Little time remains to me to discuss this important word
The cognates of this
word in Germanic show a semantic pattern strikingly similar to those dis-
cussed above. f quote from Fdk-Torp 161 : tfmm m. Zeit ags. t8ma
m. Zeit, reohte Zeit, Gelegenheit ; . . . tih n. Gelegenheit, Ziel . .. piltmnd.
ti1 n. Creme, Ziel, ahd. Zil n. Grcnec, Ende, Ziel.
Sulpwv is derived from IE* d t i /aa i ‘divide ’.
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L. R. PALMER-INDO-EUROPEAN ORIGINS OF GREEK JUSTICE 167
and I must content myself with a few illustrative quotations.That the Galpoves are bestowers of wealth, like Bhaga, is
clear from Hesiod W D 122 ff., where the S a l p o v ~ s eceive the
epithet ?rhauroGdrai. R ut an evil portion, too, may be meted
out by the daimon, for Homer speaks of Galpovos a h a
The equivalents of Amga arid Bhaga are to be found in the
Slavonic world, too, as has been pointed ou t to me by Professor
Roman Jakobson, with whom I had the privilege of dis-
cussing this paper shortly before it went to press. H e has
very kindly allowed me to quote from his forthcoming article
in the Standard Dictionary of Folklore, Mythology, and
Legend, Vol. 11, New Y ork, 1950, p . 1026 ff.
“ Both Slavs and Iranians eliminated the Indo-European
name of the worshipped (sacred) sky (= d&?uus). They agree
(1) in substituting the name of the cloud for that of the sky,
(2) in converting the derivative ‘ celestial ’ (= deiwos) used
by Indo-Europeans to denote gods into the name of hostiledemonic beings (cf. the term divii attested in the demonology
of various Slavic peoples and the corresponding she-demon
divii, diva, i v o h a ) , and (3) in assigning the general meaning
of god to a term which originally signified both ‘ wealth ’and its giver (bogic). . . . Like the Vedic VFtrahan the Slavic
Svarogii generated th e sun-Xiiwii Daiibogii according to th e
Old Russian records. These designations su rvive among o ld
personal names, Dadzbog in Polish, I irs in Serbian. Helmold’s
ydolum . . . Podaga ” is perhaps a distortion of Dabog. For
the bookmen, Daiibog 6 was identical with Helios. I n old
Russian tradition both the celestial an d th e hearth fire is said
to be Svarogii’s son. Xiirsii is an obvious borrowing from th e
Iranian expression fo r the personified radiant su n (Xursid in
Persian). Daiibogii means the ‘giver of wealth ’ like the Vedic
Bhaga. Stribogii, the neighbour of Daiibogzi on the Kievan hill
before Russia’s conversion, means literally the apportioner of
wealth ’ like Bhaga’s partner Arnqa” (italics mine). To thisevidence we may add th a t of t he Russian expressions for
fatc-ddlja and dasti, both of which mean “ par t , share ”
IK a K T .
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168 TRANSACTIONS OF THE PHILOLOGICAL SOCIETY 1950
(see Schrader-Nehring RL TI 291) and provide us with
exa ct Slavonic equivalents of th e Greek poipa and a h .
B ut i t is opportune for me, too, t o observe th e proper limits
of time a nd to draw tig ht the boundary ropes of my argument
in to a narrow compass. To recapitulate briefly, a purely
philological quest starti ng from w ha t was apparently a rem ote
field, has led us to the hea rt of Greek moral thinking. Here we
have confirmed the views of earlier scholars, such as Cornford,
who established that " the Greeks believed that there was anorder in human affairs which cohered with an order in
surrounding nature an d derived its sanction from that world
order ". This order was the result of an elemental act of
apportionment whereby each co rq o n en t of the universe, gods,
men, and natural objects had its allotted portion, the
boundaries of which might not be transgressed without grave
results. This view of the world finds expresHioii in a closely
cohering structure of moral terms among which a b a , poipa ,
V ~ ~ J L E L T L S ,nd Salpwv are etymologically tran sp are ikl W hat
I hope to have shown to-day is that 6 1 ~ ~oes riot mean
" a p a t h " or " pronouncement )', but in t h e sense of
" boundary mark " forms an integral part of that coherent
structure, and further to have made o u t a t least a prima facie
case for believing that this peculiar structure of ideas occurs
elsewhere in t he IE world and so justifies th e postulate of an
IE origin. It is this 1E inheritance, perpe tuated in G reek idiom
an d so passed down from generation to generation, which wasagain laid bare in Plato's keen analysis of justice as 4 r d
a&ov^ Tpd-rrEw K a l p$ noXvnpaypoveiv (Republic IV, 4338) .
Where there is
respect for %K V , the boundary, there reigns rivopia, proper distribution,
and that state of balance and tranquillity which tho Greeks called a 'p$v?.
It is this which is cxprevsed in the myth which makes AL'KV Edvopia nnd
Ei p j v q tho dnughterx of Themis (Hcnitrd ' l 'hogony 901). To them threc
sisters the Greeks g i ~ v t ' he namc 'Qpac . Is it an ncoidcnt tha t $pa is aliio the
Greek w u r d for a divixiun of timc, part of t,hc year, fitting timc or sewon ?
The system w as also exprcsscd in it mythological form.