Napoleon once said that ‘there are only two powers in the world, the sword and the spirit’ and that ‘in the long run the sword will always be conquered by the spirit.’ The results of this study, which delves into the etymology and phraseology of Greek terms belonging to the semantic sphere of power, agree with the Emperor’s perspective.

The Greek power-word krátos expresses the idea of possessing or obtaining superiority, often with the use of brute force. After all, Kratos is the brother of Bia, ‘Violence’, according to Hesiod’s Theogony, and that same pair are the ruthless enactors of Zeus’s will in the tragedy Prometheus Bound. Yet the use of the adjective kratús in the Iliad and Odyssey tells a different story. Kratús is an epithet of Hermes, the most guileful and the least warlike of the Olympian gods. With his cunning tricks and his elusiveness, Hermes is the divine embodiment of intelligence. Since ancient times he has been regarded as a benevolent god, who starts quarrels for fun, but does not really like to fight. Nor does the association of kratús with the epithet Argeiphóntēs, which is regularly applied to Hermes, offer any clue. Argeiphóntēs was interpreted in antiquity as ‘killer of Argus’, but its meaning is actually obscure, with recent analyses pointing towards the sense ‘shining (-phóntēs) with white light (argei-)’. Thus the discrepancy between Hermes’ character and the meaning of kratús stands. What can we do about it?

To solve this issue, my article invokes the help of diachronic linguistics. It examines krátos, kratús and other linguistic relatives under the lens of historical linguistics and compares the Greek terms with two related terms in ancient Indo-Iranian, a language family which, like Greek, descended from the lost proto-language which today we call ‘Indo-European’. Greek krátos and kratús show great formal resemblance to two Indo-Iranian words, namely Vedic krátu- ‘purpose, will’ and Avestan xratu- ‘guiding intellect’. Both nouns denote qualities which allow their possessor to achieve victory, success, and prosperity. Their semantics thus resemble those of Greek krátos. At the same time, Vedic krátu- ‘mighty/endowed with superior purpose’ (cf. Greek kratús) is used as an adjective of different deities, including the fire-god Agni, who shares a variety of traits with Hermes. Among other common features, Agni is the only god who receives the epithet bhā́r̥jīka- ‘shining of white appearance’ in the Rigveda, the most ancient religious book of India. Vedic bhā́r̥jīka- is built with the same lexical material as Greek Argeiphóntēs: Vedic bhā́– goes back to the same root as Greek –phóntēs, and Vedic –r̥jīka– contains the same root as argei-. Other Vedic passages describe krátu- as a quality providing distinction to its possessor. Whoever possesses krátu- can, literally, ‘shine widely.’ Both Agni and Hermes are thus imagined as gods endowed with superior might and the capacity to shine.

This linguistic and comparative analysis therefore changes the semantic nuances of some Greek terms for ‘power’, by bringing to light the link between krátos and purposefulness, as well as with intellectual superiority. Hermes’ might, this study confirms, does not rely upon the sword. On the contrary, Hermes triumphs and shines thanks to the superiority of his intelligence – or, to put it in terms which Napoleon would have recognised, of his resolute spirit.

Read the associated article A COMPARATIVE LENS ON ΚΡΑΤΥΣ ΑΡΓΕΪΦΟΝΤΗΣ: MEANING, ETYMOLOGY AND PHRASEOLOGY – out in The Classical Quarterly now. Access is free until the end of March 2023.