''Cratylus'' ( ; , ) is the name of a dialogue by

Plato Plato ( ; Greek language, Greek: , ; born BC, died 348/347 BC) was an ancient Greek philosopher of the Classical Greece, Classical period who is considered a foundational thinker in Western philosophy and an innovator of the writte ...

. Most modern scholars agree that it was written mostly during Plato's so-called middle period. In the dialogue,

Socrates Socrates (; ; – 399 BC) was a Ancient Greek philosophy, Greek philosopher from Classical Athens, Athens who is credited as the founder of Western philosophy and as among the first moral philosophers of the Ethics, ethical tradition ...

is asked by two men, Cratylus and Hermogenes, to tell them whether names are "conventional" or "natural", that is, whether

language Language is a structured system of communication that consists of grammar and vocabulary. It is the primary means by which humans convey meaning, both in spoken and signed language, signed forms, and may also be conveyed through writing syste ...

is a system of arbitrary signs or whether words have an intrinsic relation to the things they signify. The individual Cratylus was the first intellectual influence on Plato.

Aristotle Aristotle (; 384–322 BC) was an Ancient Greek philosophy, Ancient Greek philosopher and polymath. His writings cover a broad range of subjects spanning the natural sciences, philosophy, linguistics, economics, politics, psychology, a ...

states that Cratylus influenced Plato by introducing to him the teachings of

Heraclitus Heraclitus (; ; ) was an Ancient Greece, ancient Greek Pre-Socratic philosophy, pre-Socratic philosopher from the city of Ephesus, which was then part of the Achaemenid Empire, Persian Empire. He exerts a wide influence on Western philosophy, ...

, according to M. W. Riley.

Summary

The subject of Cratylus is ''on'' ''the correctness of names'' (), in other words, it is a critique on the subject of naming (Baxter). When discussing an ('' onoma'') and how it would relate to its subject, Socrates compares the original creation of a word to the work of an artist. An artist uses color to express the essence of his subject in a painting. In much the same way, the creator of words uses letters containing certain sounds to express the essence of a word's subject. There is a letter that is best for soft things, one for liquid things, and so on. He comments: One countering position, held by Hermogenes, is that names have come about due to custom and convention. They do not express the essence of their subject, so they can be swapped with something unrelated by the individuals or communities who use them. The line between the two perspectives is often blurred. During more than half of the dialogue, Socrates makes guesses at Hermogenes's request as to where names and words have come from. These include the names of the

Olympian gods upright=1.8, Fragment of a relief (1st century BC1st century AD) depicting the twelve Olympians carrying their attributes in procession; from left to right: Hestia (scepter), Hermes (winged cap and staff), Aphrodite (veiled), Ares (helmet and s ...

, personified deities, and many words that describe abstract concepts. He examines whether, for example, giving names of "streams" to

Cronus In ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology, Cronus, Cronos, or Kronos ( or ; ) was the leader and youngest of the Titans, the children of Gaia (Earth) and Uranus (mythology), Uranus (Sky). He overthrew his father and ruled dur ...

and Rhea ( – 'flow' or 'space') are purely accidental. The Greek term "ῥεῦμα" may refer to the flow of any medium and is not restricted to the flow of water or liquids. Many of the words which Socrates uses as examples may have come from an idea originally linked to the name, but have changed over time. Those of which he cannot find a link, he often assumes have come from foreign origins or have changed so much as to lose all resemblance to the original word. He states, "names have been so twisted in all manner of ways, that I should not be surprised if the old language when compared with that now in use would appear to us to be a barbarous tongue." The final theory of relations between name and object named is posited by Cratylus, a disciple of

, who believes that names arrive from divine origins, making them necessarily correct. Socrates rebukes this theory by reminding Cratylus of the imperfection of certain names in capturing the objects they seek to signify. From this point, Socrates ultimately rejects the study of language, believing it to be philosophically inferior to a study of things themselves.

Name of Hades

An extended section of ''Cratylus'' is devoted to the origin of the name of

Hades Hades (; , , later ), in the ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, mythology, is the god of the dead and the king of the Greek underworld, underworld, with which his name became synonymous. Hades was the eldest son of Cronus and Rhea ...

. This etymology, through the lens of modern

comparative linguistics Comparative linguistics is a branch of historical linguistics that is concerned with comparing languages to establish their historical relatedness. Genetic relatedness implies a common origin or proto-language and comparative linguistics aim ...

, is unknown, but has carried a

folk etymology Folk etymology – also known as (generative) popular etymology, analogical reformation, (morphological) reanalysis and etymological reinterpretation – is a change in a word or phrase resulting from the replacement of an unfamiliar form by a mo ...

since antiquity as meaning "The Unseen One". Modern linguists have proposed a

Proto-Greek The Proto-Greek language (also known as Proto-Hellenic) is the Indo-European language which was the last common ancestor of all varieties of Greek, including Mycenaean Greek, the subsequent ancient Greek dialects (i.e., Attic, Ionic, Ae ...

form of , literally 'unseen'. The earliest attested form is (), which lacks the proposed

digamma Digamma or wau (uppercase: Ϝ, lowercase: ϝ, numeral: ϛ) is an Archaic Greek alphabets, archaic letter of the Greek alphabet. It originally stood for the sound but it has remained in use principally as a Greek numeral for 6 (number), 6. Whe ...

. In ''Cratylus'',

jocularly argues for a folk etymology not from 'unseen' but from 'his knowledge ( ) of all noble things".

Hades's name in classical Greek

The sound was lost at various times in various dialects, mostly before the classical period. In Ionic, had probably disappeared before

Homer Homer (; , ; possibly born ) was an Ancient Greece, Ancient Greek poet who is credited as the author of the ''Iliad'' and the ''Odyssey'', two epic poems that are foundational works of ancient Greek literature. Despite doubts about his autho ...

's epics were written down (7th century BC), but its former presence can be detected in many cases because its omission left the

meter The metre (or meter in US spelling; symbol: m) is the base unit of length in the International System of Units (SI). Since 2019, the metre has been defined as the length of the path travelled by light in vacuum during a time interval of of ...

defective. For example, the words (; ' tribal king', 'lord', '(military) leader') and (; 'wine') are sometimes found in the

Iliad The ''Iliad'' (; , ; ) is one of two major Ancient Greek epic poems attributed to Homer. It is one of the oldest extant works of literature still widely read by modern audiences. As with the ''Odyssey'', the poem is divided into 24 books and ...

in the meter where a word starting with a consonant would be expected. Cognate-analysis and earlier written evidence shows that earlier these words would have been (, attested to in this form in Mycenaean Greek) and (; cf. Cretan Doric , cf.

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

and English 'wine').

Appropriate sounds

* ('r') is a "tool for copying every sort of motion ()."e.g. ('flowing'), ('flow'), ('trembling'), ('running'), ('striking'), ('crushing'), ('rending'), ('breaking'), ('crumbling'), ('whirling'). * ('i') for imitating "all the small things that can most easily penetrate everything",e.g. ('moving'), ('hastening'). * ('phi'), ('psi'). ('s'), and ('z') as "all these letters are pronounced with an expulsion of breath", they are most appropriate for imitating "blowing or hard breathing".Cratylus 427a.e.g. ('chilling'), ('seething'), ('shaking'), ('quaking'). * ('d') and ('t') as both involve "compression and hestopping of the power of the tongue" when pronounced, they are most appropriate for words indicating a lack or stopping of motion.e.g. ('shackling'), ('rest'). * ('l'), as "the tongue glides most of all" when pronounced, it is most appropriate for words denoting a sort of gliding.Cratylus 427b.e.g. ('glide'), ('smooth'), ('sleek'), ('viscous'). * ('g') best used when imitating "something cloying", as the gliding of the tongue is stopped when pronounced.e.g. ('gluey'), ('sweet'), ('clammy'). * ('n') best used when imitating inward things, as it is "sounded inwardly".Cratylus 427c.e.g. ('within'), ('inside'). * ('a'), ('long e') best used when imitating large things, as they are both "pronounced long".e.g. ('large'), ('length'). * ('o') best used when imitating roundness.e.g. ('round'). Although these are clear examples of

onomatopoeia Onomatopoeia (or rarely echoism) is a type of word, or the process of creating a word, that phonetics, phonetically imitates, resembles, or suggests the sound that it describes. Common onomatopoeias in English include animal noises such as Oin ...

, Socrates's statement that words are not musical imitations of nature suggests that Plato did not believe that language itself generates from sound words.

Platonic theory of forms

Plato's

theory of forms The Theory of Forms or Theory of Ideas, also known as Platonic idealism or Platonic realism, is a philosophical theory credited to the Classical Greek philosopher Plato. A major concept in metaphysics, the theory suggests that the physical w ...

also makes an appearance. For example, no matter what a hammer is made out of, it is still called a "hammer", and thus is the ''form'' of a hammer:

Socrates: So mustn't a rule-setter also know how to embody in sounds and syllables the name naturally suited to each thing? And if he is to be an authentic giver of names, mustn't he, in making and giving each name, look to what a name itself is? And if different rule-setters do not make each name out of the same syllables, we mustn't forget that different blacksmiths, who are making the same tool for the same type of work, don't all make it out of the same iron. But as long as they give it the same form--even if that form is embodied in different iron--the tool will be correct, whether it is made in Greece or abroad. Isn't that so?

Plato's theory of forms again appears at 439c, when Cratylus concedes the existence of "a beautiful itself, and a good itself, and the same for each one of the things that are".

Influence, legacy

German psychologist Karl Ludwig Bühler used the Cratylus dialogue as the basis for his organon model of communication, published in 1934.

Gérard Genette Gérard Genette (; 7 June 1930 – 11 May 2018) was a French literary theorist, associated in particular with the structuralist movement and with figures such as Roland Barthes and Claude Lévi-Strauss, from whom he adapted the concept of ''b ...

, in the work 'Mimologie. Voyage en Cratilie' (1976), starts from Plato's speech to argue the idea of arbitrariness of the sign: according to this thesis, already supported by the great linguist

Ferdinand de Saussure Ferdinand Mongin de Saussure (; ; 26 November 185722 February 1913) was a Swiss linguist, semiotician and philosopher. His ideas laid a foundation for many significant developments in both linguistics and semiotics in the 20th century. He is wi ...

, the connection between language and objects is not natural, but culturally determined. The ideas developed in the Cratylus, although sometimes dated, have historically been an important point of reference in the development of Linguistics. On the basis of the Craylus Gaetano Licata has reconstructed in the essay 'Plato's theory of language. Perspectives on the concept of truth' (2007, Il Melangolo), the platonic conception of semantics, according to which names have a natural link (an essential foundation) with their "nominatum".

Texts and translations

* An early translation was made by Thomas Taylor in 1804. * * Plato: ''Cratylus, Parmenides, Greater Hippias, Lesser Hippias.'' With translation by Harold N. Fowler. Loeb Classical Library 167. Harvard Univ. Press (originally published 1926).
HUP listing
* Plato: ''Opera'', Volume I. Oxford Classical Texts. * Plato: ''Complete Works.'' Hackett, 1997. *Dalimier, C., 1998, ''Platon, Cratyle'', Paris: Flammarion. *Méridier, L., 1931, ''Platon, Cratyle'', Paris: Les belles lettres. *Reeve, C. D. C., 1997, ''Plato, Cratylus: translated with introduction and notes'', Indianapolis and Cambridge: Hackett; reprinted in J. M. Cooper. (ed.) ''Plato, Complete Works'', Indianapolis and Cambridge: Hackett.

Footnotes

References

External links

*
Bibliography on Plato's ''Cratylus'' (PDF)''Cratylus''
translation by Benjamin Jowett (1892) starting at Page 323 * {{Authority control Dialogues of Plato History of linguistics Philosophy of language literature Onomasticon