English
aphesis
Aphesis comes from Ancient Greek ἄφεσις ‘letting go’, from ἀφίημι ‘to send forth, discharge, emit’, and ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *(H)yeh₁- ‘to throw’.
- Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*(H)yeh₁-1‘to throw’reconstructed
- Proto-Hellenicc. 2200–1600 BCE*yīyēmi1reconstructed
- Ancient Greekc. 800–300 BCEἵημι2híēmi‘send forth’
- Ancient Greekc. 800–300 BCEἀφίημι2‘to send forth, discharge, emit’
- Ancient Greekc. 800–300 BCEἄφεσις2áphesis‘letting go’
- Englishtodayaphesis2
attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor
- 1 Wiktionary, Ancient Greek ἵημι
- 2 Wiktionary, English aphesis
Lineage
- Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*(H)yeh₁-Wiktionary, Ancient Greek ἵημι‘to throw’reconstructed
- Proto-Hellenicc. 2200–1600 BCE*yīyēmiWiktionary, Ancient Greek ἵημιreconstructed
- Ancient Greekc. 800–300 BCEἵημιWiktionary, English aphesishíēmi‘send forth’
- Ancient Greekc. 800–300 BCEἀφίημιWiktionary, English aphesis‘to send forth, discharge, emit’
- Ancient Greekc. 800–300 BCEἄφεσιςWiktionary, English aphesisáphesis‘letting go’
- EnglishtodayaphesisWiktionary, English aphesis
The story
Attested since 1880.
Linked words
through Proto-Indo-European *(H)yeh₁- ‘to throw’
year, project, hour, disease, object, ease, jet, adjacent, injection, trajectory, inject, jess, conjecture, ejection, jetty, abject, eject, ejaculation, gist, ejaculate, jut, subjection, interject, jettison, jetsam, joist, 41 more
through Ancient Greek ἵημι ‘send forth’
Today it means
noun The loss of the initial unstressed vowel of a word.
Sources
Sources: Wiktionary, “aphesis”; the older steps come from the Wiktionary entry for Ancient Greek ἵημι. By Wiktionary contributors, CC BY-SA 4.0, via kaikki.org (dump of Oct 3 2026); text adapted and restructured. Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word. License.
Etymograph / Proto-Indo-European *(H)yeh₁- / aphesis