- Volume 52 (2016-2017)
- Vol. 52 (2016-2017)
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- Issue 2
- No. 2
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- Pages 177 - 201
- pp. 177 - 201
“La belle Hélène”, a generic brothel, and the development of *CṚHC sequences in Ancient Greek
Pages 177 - 201
Starting from a discussion of the name Ἑλένη and the root *sṷelh1 „to glow with heat‟, this paper investigates the outcome of accented *CṚHC sequences in Greek. Most of the cases on record involve *CṚh2C, resulting in Gk. CάRαC. In theory, this sequence could either represent a PGk. *CáRaC or a PGk. *CəRaC, which has led to two opposing views in the literature as to what the outcome of *CṚh1C and *CṚh3C would be, viz. either CέRεC and CόRοC, or CάRεC and CάRοC, respectively. Based on the examples Ion. ἀλέη f. „heat‟ and Gk. (non-Att.) γάνεα n. pl. „female genitals‟, I intend to show that the latter is the more likely assumption.