Hera, Eros, Iuno Sororia

This article aims to provide the name of Hera, the Greek goddess of brides, weddings, and marriage, with an etymology that is satisfactory both from a historical and from a linguistic point of view. Earlier suggestions are rejected because they either disregard the central features of Hera\'s character or fail to do justice to the Mycenaean evidence favouring an etymon *Sē rah2. The latter is here explained as a well-formed vflrddhi derivative of an Indo-European root noun *sor(H)-/*ser(H)- \'woman, female\', which has long been posited for independent reasons and which may belong with the verbal root *ser(H)- \'to attach\' suggesting an original notion of \'female partner\'. Since other derivatives of this root *ser(H)- may irregularly show no initial aspiration in Greek, a further connection with the name of the love god Eros is possible via an s-stem derivative *ser(H)-(o)s. Outside Greece, apart from a possible link to the Indian Goddess Sarasvati, the same formation seems to underly the epithet of the Roman divinity Iūnō Sorō ria, which - given the goddess\'s function as a protector of adolescent young women - can have nothing to do with the Latin word for \'sister\', but must also refer to the young women\'s newly acquired ability and wish to enter a marital union.