Editing Hecate (section)

==Name==
===Etymology===
Potential Greek source words have been suggested for the goddess's name. The word ἑκών, meaning "willing" (thus, "she who works her will" or similar), may be related to the name Hecate.<ref>At least in the case of [[Hesiod]]'s use, see {{cite book |first=Jenny Strauss |last=Clay |title=Hesiod's Cosmos |url=https://archive.org/details/hesiodscosmos0000clay |url-access=registration |location=Cambridge |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=2003 |page=[https://archive.org/details/hesiodscosmos0000clay/page/135 135] |isbn=0-521-82392-7 }} Clay lists a number of researchers who have advanced some variant of the association between Hecate's name and will (e.g. Walcot (1958), Neitzel (1975), Derossi (1975)). The researcher is led to identify "the name and function of Hecate as the one 'by whose will' prayers are accomplished and fulfilled." This interpretation also appears in Liddell-Scott, ''A Greek English Lexicon'', in the entry for Hecate, which is glossed as "lit. 'she who works her will'"</ref> However, no sources suggested list will or willingness as a major attribute of Hecate, which calls this assertion into question.<ref name=mooney>Mooney, Carol M., "Hekate: Her Role and Character in Greek Literature from before the Fifth Century B.C." (1971). Open Access Dissertations and heses. Paper 4651.</ref> Another Greek word suggested as the origin of the name Hecate is Ἑκατός ''Hekatos'', an obscure epithet of [[Apollo]]<ref name="s.v. Hecate"/> interpreted as "the far-reaching one" or "the far-darter".<ref>{{cite book |first=P. E. |last=Wheelwright |title=Metaphor and Reality |year=1975 |location=Bloomington |publisher=Indiana University Press |page=[https://archive.org/details/metaphorreality0000whee_u1f6/page/144 144] |isbn=0-253-20122-5 |url=https://archive.org/details/metaphorreality0000whee_u1f6/page/144 }}</ref> This has been suggested in comparison with the attributes of the goddess [[Artemis]], strongly associated with Apollo and frequently equated with Hecate in the classical world. Supporters of this etymology suggest that Hecate was originally considered an aspect of Artemis prior to the latter's adoption into the Olympian pantheon. Artemis would have, at that point, become more strongly associated with purity and maidenhood, on the one hand, while her originally darker attributes like her association with magic, the souls of the dead, and the night would have continued to be worshipped separately under her title Hecate.<ref>Fairbanks, Arthur. A Handbook of Greek Religion. American Book Company, 1910.</ref> Though often considered the most likely Greek origin of the name, the Ἑκατός theory does not account for her worship in Asia Minor, where her association with Artemis seems to have been a late development, and the competing theories that the attribution of darker aspects and magic to Hecate were themselves not originally part of her cult.<ref name=mooney/> [[Robert S. P. Beekes|R. S. P. Beekes]] rejected a Greek etymology and suggested a [[Pre-Greek]] origin.<ref>[[Robert S. P. Beekes|R. S. P. Beekes]], ''Etymological Dictionary of Greek'' (2010), Brill, p. 396.</ref>

===Older English pronunciation and spelling===
In [[Early Modern English]], the name was also pronounced disyllabically (as {{IPAc-en|ˈ|h|ɛ|k|.|ɪ|t}}) and sometimes spelled ''Hecat''. It remained common practice in English to pronounce her name in two syllables, even when spelled with final ''e'', well into the 19th century.<ref>{{cite web |url= https://www.oed.com/dictionary/hecate_n?tab=factsheet#1939829|title= Hecat |date= 1898 |website=Oxford English Dictionary |access-date= June 21, 2024}}</ref>

The spelling ''Hecat'' is due to [[Arthur Golding]]'s 1567 translation of [[Ovid]]'s ''[[Metamorphoses]]'',<ref>{{cite book |author-link=Arthur Golding |last=Golding |first=Arthur |year=1567 |section-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=asGFKAUTQC8C&pg=PA243 |title-link=Metamorphoses |title=Ovid's Metamorphoses |publisher=Read Books |section=Book Seven |isbn=9781406792416 }}</ref> and this spelling without the final E later appears in plays of the [[Elizabethan era|Elizabethan]]-[[Jacobean era|Jacobean]] period.<ref>{{cite book |author-link=Christopher Marlowe |author=Marlowe, Christopher |date=c. 1603 |orig-date=first published 1604; performed earlier |title-link=Doctor Faustus (play) |title=Doctor Faustus |via=Google Books |at=[https://books.google.com/books?id=vaNlzzIqXe0C&dq=Hecat&pg=PA42 act&nbsp;III, scene&nbsp;2, line&nbsp;21] |quote=Pluto's blue fire and Hecat's tree}}<br />{{cite book |author-link=William Shakespeare |author=Shakespeare, William |date=c. 1595 |orig-date={{circa|1594–1596}} |title=[[A Midsummer Night's Dream]] |at=[https://books.google.com/books?id=Ey2gnY51jmoC&dq=%22By+the+triple+Hecat%27s+team%22&pg=PT195 act&nbsp;V, scene&nbsp;1, line&nbsp;384] |quote=By the triple Hecat's team}}<br />{{cite book |author=Shakespeare, William |author-link=William Shakespeare |date=c. 1605 |orig-date={{circa|1603–1607}} |title=[[Macbeth]] |at=[http://www.playshakespeare.com/macbeth/scenes/257-act-iii-scene-5 act&nbsp;III, scene&nbsp;5, line&nbsp;1] |quote=Why, how now, Hecat!}}<br />{{cite book |author-link=Ben Jonson |author=Jonson, Ben |orig-year=c. 1637 |year=1641 |section-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8XcLAAAAIAAJ&dq=%22our+dame+Hecat%22&pg=PA144 |title=The Sad Shepherd |section=act&nbsp;II, scene&nbsp;3, line&nbsp;668 |quote=our dame Hecat}}</ref>
[[Webster's Dictionary]] of 1866 particularly credits the influence of [[William Shakespeare|Shakespeare]] for the then-predominant disyllabic pronunciation of the name.<ref>{{cite book |last=Webster |first=Noah |year=1866 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gmwIAAAAQAAJ&pg=PT9 |title=A Dictionary of the English Language |edition=10th |quote=Rules for pronouncing the vowels of Greek and Latin proper names", p.&nbsp;9:&nbsp;"''Hecate'' ..., pronounced in three syllables when in Latin, and in the same number in the Greek word ''Ἑκάτη''; in English is universally contracted into two, by sinking the final ''e''. Shakespeare seems to have begun, as he has now confirmed, this pronunciation, by so adapting the word in Macbeth&nbsp;...&nbsp;. And the play-going world, who form no small portion of what is called the better sort of people, have followed the actors in this world, and the rest of the world have followed them.}}<br />{{cite book |title=[[Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable]] |year=1894 |section-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6aElzaWwzkQC&dq=Hecate&pg=RA1-PA593 |section=Hec'ate |quote=3&nbsp;syl. in Greek, 2 in Eng.}}</ref>