The semantics of the preposition ὑπέρ in Homeric Greek

Abstract

Prepositions are highly polysemic words. In Homeric Greek, they either retain a number of meanings that are lost in post-Homeric Greek, or have not yet developed other meanings that later become conventionalized. In this paper, I analyze the semantics of the preposition ὑπέρ in Homeric Greek using the terminology of cognitive grammar. In addition, I use the model of structured polysemy in order to detect the original meaning of ὑπέρ, and to distinguish, among all its meanings, those triggered by the context from those independently stored in the mind of speakers. While making such a distinction, I also take into account both the semantic development of ὑπέρ in post-Homeric Greek, and the interaction between preposition and morphological case. I then arrange the distinct meanings in a semantic network, and link them directly or indirectly to the original spatial meaning. At the end, I show how further spatial or abstract meanings develop from the original meaning.