Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

and

Roman mythology Roman mythology is the body of myths of ancient Rome as represented in the literature and visual arts of the Romans, and is a form of Roman folklore. "Roman mythology" may also refer to the modern study of these representations, and to th ...

, Anethus () is a beautiful youth who undergoes transformation under unclear conditions and becomes a small flowering plant bearing his name, the

dill Dill (''Anethum graveolens'') is an annual herb in the celery family Apiaceae. It is native to North Africa, Iran, and the Arabian Peninsula; it is grown widely in Eurasia, where its leaves and seeds are used as a herb or spice for flavouring ...

. He and his story is only found in

Maurus Servius Honoratus Servius, distinguished as Servius the Grammarian ( or ), was a late fourth-century and early fifth-century grammarian. He earned a contemporary reputation as the most learned man of his generation in Italy; he authored a set of commentaries o ...

, a Latin grammarian who lived in the fourth and fifth centuries AD.

Etymology

The ancient Greek word for dill (''anethum graveolens'') is (ánēthon), a neuter noun. It was also spelled (''ánnēthon''), (''ánēton'') and (''ánnēton''). According to

Robert Beekes Robert Stephen Paul Beekes (; 2 September 1937 – 21 September 2017) was a Dutch linguist who was emeritus professor of Comparative Indo-European Linguistics at Leiden University and an author of many monographs on the Proto-Indo-European lang ...

it is probably of

pre-Greek The pre-Greek substrate (or substratum) consists of the unknown pre-Greek language or languages (either Pre-Indo-European or other Indo-European languages) spoken in prehistoric Greece prior to the emergence of the Proto-Greek language in the r ...

origin, as are all words ending in a -thos/-thon suffix.

Mythology

The story of Anethus's minor transformation into the

plant is only found in

Servius Servius may refer to: * Servius (praenomen), a personal name during the Roman Republic * Servius the Grammarian (fl. 4th/5th century), Roman Latin grammarian * Servius Asinius Celer (died AD 46), Roman senator * Servius Cornelius Cethegus, Roma ...

, who writes that Anethus, much like the

poppy A poppy is a flowering plant in the subfamily Papaveroideae of the family Papaveraceae. Poppies are herbaceous plants, often grown for their colourful flowers. One species of poppy, '' Papaver somniferum'', is the source of the narcotic drug ...

and the

daffodil ''Narcissus'' is a genus of predominantly spring flowering perennial plants of the amaryllis family, Amaryllidaceae. Various common names including daffodil,The word "daffodil" is also applied to related genera such as '' Sternbergia'', '' ...

, belonged to the class of the beautiful youths that were transformed into the plants bearing their names. Besides this brief mention, the full story of Anethus, his family, his birthplace, the deity responsible and the context behind his transformation has been lost. In ancient Greece anethum was seen by many doctors as a suitable herb for use in cures and remedies, especially for epilepsy.

References

Bibliography

* * * *
Online version at Perseus.tufts project.
*

, ''In Vergilii carmina comentarii. Servii Grammatici qui feruntur in Vergilii carmina commentarii;'' recensuerunt Georgius Thilo et Hermannus Hagen. Georgius Thilo. Leipzig. B. G. Teubner. 1881
Online version at the Perseus Digital Library
{{Metamorphoses in Greco-Roman mythology Characters in Greek mythology Metamorphoses into flowers in Greek mythology

Etymology

Mythology

See also

References

Bibliography