πρόβλημα

Ancient Greek

From Proto-Hellenic *prógʷlāmə. Equivalent to προβάλλω (probállō, “I throw before”) +‎ -μᾰ (-mă).

πρόβλημᾰ • (próblēmă) n (genitive προβλήμᾰτος); third declension

anything thrown forward or projecting
- c. 445 BCE, Sophocles, Ajax 1219
1. a hindrance, obstacle
  - 460 BCE – 370 BCE, Hippocrates of Kos, Τοῦ μεγάλου Ἱπποκράτους πάντων τῶν ἰατρῶν κορυφαίου τὰ εὑρισκόμενα. Magni Hippocratis medicorum omnium facile principis, opera omnia quæ extant. 582.10
anything put before one as a defense, bulwark, barrier, screen, shield, wall
- 460 BCE – 430 BCE, Herodotus, Histories 7.70
1. (with genitive) a defense against a thing
  - 467 BCE, Aeschylus, Seven Against Thebes 676
anything put forward as an excuse or screen
- 384 BCE – 322 BCE, Demosthenes 1122.21
that which is proposed as a task, business
- c. 415 BCE, Euripides, Electra 985
1. (geometry) problem
  - 375 BCE, Plato, The Republic 530
2. (Aristotelian logic) a question as to whether a statement is so or not
  - 384 BCE – 322 BCE, Aristotle, Topics 1.4,3
3. a problem, difficulty
  - 200 BCE – 118 BCE, Polybius, The Histories 28.11,9

Third declension of τὸ πρόβλημᾰ; τοῦ προβλήμᾰτος (Attic)

Case / #	Singular	Dual	Plural
Nominative	τὸ πρόβλημᾰ tò próblēmă	τὼ προβλήμᾰτε tṑ problḗmăte	τᾰ̀ προβλήμᾰτᾰ tằ problḗmătă
Genitive	τοῦ προβλήμᾰτος toû problḗmătos	τοῖν προβλημᾰ́τοιν toîn problēmắtoin	τῶν προβλημᾰ́των tôn problēmắtōn
Dative	τῷ προβλήμᾰτῐ tōî problḗmătĭ	τοῖν προβλημᾰ́τοιν toîn problēmắtoin	τοῖς προβλήμᾰσῐ / προβλήμᾰσῐν toîs problḗmăsĭ(n)
Accusative	τὸ πρόβλημᾰ tò próblēmă	τὼ προβλήμᾰτε tṑ problḗmăte	τᾰ̀ προβλήμᾰτᾰ tằ problḗmătă
Vocative	πρόβλημᾰ próblēmă	προβλήμᾰτε problḗmăte	προβλήμᾰτᾰ problḗmătă
Notes:	This table gives Attic inflectional endings. For declension in other dialects, see Appendix:Ancient Greek dialectal declension.

“πρόβλημα”, in Liddell & Scott (1940), A Greek–English Lexicon, Oxford: Clarendon Press
“πρόβλημα”, in Liddell & Scott (1889), An Intermediate Greek–English Lexicon, New York: Harper & Brothers
πρόβλημα in Bailly, Anatole (1935), Le Grand Bailly: Dictionnaire grec-français, Paris: Hachette
πρόβλημα in Trapp, Erich, et al. (1994–2007), Lexikon zur byzantinischen Gräzität besonders des 9.-12. Jahrhunderts [the Lexicon of Byzantine Hellenism, Particularly the 9th–12th Centuries], Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften
Woodhouse, S. C. (1910), English–Greek Dictionary: A Vocabulary of the Attic Language‎^[1], London: Routledge & Kegan Paul Limited.
- barrier idem, page 63.
- blind idem, page 83.
- bulwark idem, page 103.
- cover idem, page 180.
- defence idem, page 204.
- pretence idem, page 638.
- pretext idem, page 638.
- problem idem, page 643.
- protection idem, page 653.
- safe-guard idem, page 730.
- screen idem, page 742.
- sham idem, page 761.
- shelter idem, page 764.
LSJ 8th edition

Learnedly, from Ancient Greek πρόβλημᾰ (próblēmă). For sense "difficulty", semantic loan from French problème or English problem.^[1]

πρόβλημα • (próvlima) n (plural προβλήματα)

^ πρόβλημα, in Λεξικό της κοινής νεοελληνικής [Dictionary of Standard Modern Greek], Triantafyllidis Foundation, 1998 at the Centre for the Greek language