Ancient Greek

Noun

ἔλλειψῐς • ‎(élleipsis) f ‎(genitive ἐλλείψεως); third declension

1. A falling short, defect
   • 460 BCE – 370 BCE, Democritus, Collected Works 102
   • 428 BCE – 347 BCE, Plato, Protagoras 356.a
   • 384 BCE – 322 BCE, Aristotle, Physics 187.a.17
   • 384 BCE – 322 BCE, Aristotle, Metaphysics 1042.b.25
   • 384 BCE – 322 BCE, Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 2.1106b.16

     λέγω δὲ τὴν ἠθικήν· αὕτη γάρ ἐστι περὶ πάθη καὶ πράξεις, ἐν δὲ τούτοις ἔστιν ὑπερβολὴ καὶ ἔλλειψις καὶ τὸ μέσον.

     • 1911 translation by D. P. Chase

       I mean moral [virtue]; for it is this that is concerned with passions and actions, and in these there is excess, defect, and the intermediate.

2. (geometry) The conic section: an ellipse
   • 262 BCE – 190 BCE, Apollonius of Perga, Conics 1.13
3. (grammar) An ellipse (the omission of a word)
   • 250–350 BC, Athenaeus, Deipnosophistae 14.644.a
   • 50 CE – 250 CE, Apollonius Dyscolus, On Syntax 117.19
4. (grammar) The omission of a letter
   • 50 CE – 250 CE, Apollonius Dyscolus, On Pronouns 56.28
5. An eclipse
   • 495 CE – 570 CE, Olympiodorus the Younger, Commentary on the Aristotle's Meteorology 67.37

Declension

Antonyms

• (defect): ὑπερβολή ‎(huperbolḗ), ὑπεροχή ‎(huperokhḗ)

References

• ἔλλειψις in Liddell & Scott (1940) A Greek–English Lexicon, Oxford: Clarendon Press