LEXICON OF ORIENTAL WORDS IN ANCIENT GREEK

ἀνάκης <Unspecified origin; Early Byzantine period>

👉 ἀνάκης – ‘a kind of a small Indian bird’ (Hsch. α 4350).

Hsch. α 4350: ἀνάκης· ὄρνεόν τι ᾿Ινδικόν, ὅμοιον ψάρῳ – “anakēs: an Indian bird similar to a starling”.

🅔 Perhaps a word coming from a language used in India. Cf. some unlikely hypotheses put forward to date: 1. from Old Indic ānaka- ‘drum; thunder-cloud’; the cry of this bird would resemble a sound of a drum; 2. from Tamil (in Ceylon) nākanam pătchi ‘Brahminy starling (Sturnus pagodarum)’.

📖 Ref.: cf. Arnott 2007: 22; Brust 2008: 70f.; Goossens 1943: 53f.; Thompson 1936: 51.