Our Coptic language > What is the meaning of ?

Virgin

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Anaksunamun:
Just like a post I previously replied to "Coptic word for 'nut'", I have also not found a true term for virgin unrelated to Greek. I don't believe they necessarily had a word for this.
I would assume they just said "a young wo/man, girl/boy" or had some colloquial term like "marriagable girl/boy"  and left it at that without getting into specifics and once the Greek conquest came with Christianity they needed a term for 'virgin' since it's an integral part of Christianity and the 'Virgin Mary'.

bashandy:
I would agree that ⲣⲟⲟⲩⲛⲉ means virgin, it descended from Demotic rn.t, Hieroglyphic Egyptian rnn.t maiden

I was wondering why there is a need to avoid Greek loanwords. The aim is usually to try to write as natives wrote or spoke. In most of the texts that I read the term 'parthenos' and 'chorus' were used. Also terms like ⲡⲁⲣⲑⲉⲛⲟⲥ & ⲣⲟⲟⲩⲛⲉ may not have the exact shade of meaning. This is something that may not be entirely clear from dictionaries or books.

There is history of avoiding Greek loanwords that dates back to early 20th century's attempt of revival of Coptic language which was rooted in nationalistic values, this extended to multiple writers. In my view, the outcome in some circumstances created confusion of certain meanings, and use of obscure terms as the aim was to 'purify' Coptic rather than to communicate. The concept of linguistic purity is an artificial one, as Ancient Egyptian had multitude of loandwords. Coptic has loanwords from Greek, Hebrew, Arabic, Syriac, Akkadian, Latin, Persian and others. A quick glance in Cerny's Coptic etymological dictionary.

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