You do not currently have permission to view the full text for this document. Please sign in to an account with an active subscription or contact support.
It is interesting to note some of the derivatives from the Latin name of the goddess of love, in the form of the word, Venus, which are of importance in our language. This root is expressed both in more sublimated and in less sublimated, more primitive forms.
Venus was, of course, the ancient Roman goddess of love, later identified with the Greek Aphrodite. Love being a word of many meanings, derivatives in sublimated forms appear from the Latin venerari in venerate, venerable, reverential, which are expressions of love in the form of respect, regard, deference.
In other forms, it appears in venery (which means both the pursuit of sexual delight and the sports of hunting) and venereal. Venial, a modifier of sin or error has, however, the more sublimated, positive meaning of excusable, pardonable. The word Venus is related to the Sanskrit vanas, desire. Through the Latin venari (to hunt)—and probably the Sanskrit vanati (he desires, attacks, gains)—these unsublimated meanings are derived. Venison, once a term for the flesh of any edible beast has come to its narrower meaning of deer meat.
Of special interest, in view of the antithetical meanings of primal words1 such as altus meaning both 'high' and 'deep', is the derivation of 'venom'. This is believed by etymologists to have been originally the term for a love potion; hence the connection with Venus. The word 'wish' apparently derives in part from the related Sanskrit vanchati.
This is all perhaps best expressed in a diagram (see next page).