On Sun, 20 Sep 1998 07:23:58 GMT, ew65 at bcs.org.uk (Robert Stonehouse)
wrote:
>mentifex at scn.org (Mentifex) wrote:
>>>Thank you, Yves De Rop <Yves.De.Rop at village.uunet.be>, for asking:
>>>>> Does someone knows what an ephapse is?
>>Apsis can also mean the orbit of a planet: might 'ephapse' be an
>epicycle? In astronomy, it is the point of nearest and furthest
>approach of a satellite to the body it orbits, e.g. apogee and
>perigee for the moon. So could it be 'somewhere close to apogee'?
>ew65 at bcs.org.uk
I have not followed the original thread, but FWIW in Ancient Greek
ephapsis means 'contact, touching'. It is rare and in Aeschylus it is
used, I guess, with an amatory connotation, i.e. caress.
As an aside, in Modern Greek, ephapsias is the person who
seeks crowded places in order to surreptitiously caress others :-)
ns
.