ὀβολός

Ancient Greek

Etymology

From ὀβελός (obelós, “spit, rod”). Plutarch tells us in Lysander 17 that, in early times, nails (ὀβελοί (obeloí)) were used as money, six of which made a handful (δραχμή (drakhmḗ)), and that the name was changed to ὀβολός (obolós).

Pronunciation

 

• IPA^(key): /o.bo.lós/ → /o.βoˈlos/ → /o.voˈlos/

• (5^th BCE Attic) IPA^(key): /o.bo.lós/
• (1^st CE Egyptian) IPA^(key): /o.boˈlos/
• (4^th CE Koine) IPA^(key): /o.βoˈlos/
• (10^th CE Byzantine) IPA^(key): /o.voˈlos/
• (15^th CE Constantinopolitan) IPA^(key): /o.voˈlos/

Noun

ὀβολός • (obolós) m (genitive ὀβολοῦ); second declension

1. obol, obolus, used at Athens as both a weight and a coin, equaling one sixth of a drachma
   1. a Corcyrean coin

Inflection

Second declension of ὁ ὀβολός; τοῦ ὀβολοῦ (Attic)

Case / #	Singular	Dual	Plural
Nominative	ὁ ὀβολός ho obolós	τὼ ὀβολώ tṑ obolṓ	οἱ ὀβολοί hoi oboloí
Genitive	τοῦ ὀβολοῦ toû oboloû	τοῖν ὀβολοῖν toîn oboloîn	τῶν ὀβολῶν tôn obolôn
Dative	τῷ ὀβολῷ tôi obolôi	τοῖν ὀβολοῖν toîn oboloîn	τοῖς ὀβολοῖς toîs oboloîs
Accusative	τὸν ὀβολόν tòn obolón	τὼ ὀβολώ tṑ obolṓ	τοὺς ὀβολούς toùs oboloús
Vocative	ὀβολέ obolé	ὀβολώ obolṓ	ὀβολοί oboloí
Notes:	This table gives Attic inflectional endings. For declension in other dialects, see Appendix:Ancient Greek dialectal declension.

Derived terms

• ὀβολοστᾰ́της (obolostátēs)

Descendants

• → Latin: obolus
  • → French: obole
• → Persian: پول (pul, “money”)

Further reading

• “ὀβολός”, in Liddell & Scott (1940) A Greek–English Lexicon, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “ὀβολός”, in Liddell & Scott (1889) An Intermediate Greek–English Lexicon, New York: Harper & Brothers
• ὀβολός in Bailly, Anatole (1935) Le Grand Bailly: Dictionnaire grec-français, Paris: Hachette
• Woodhouse, S. C. (1910) English–Greek Dictionary: A Vocabulary of the Attic Language‎^[1], London: Routledge & Kegan Paul Limited.
  • penny idem, page 603.
• http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/greece-xiv