Jowett: aeitheer

Soc. Any violent interpretations of the words should be avoided ; for something to say about them may easily be found. And thus I get rid of pur and udor. Aer (air), Hermogenes, may be explained as the element which raises (airei) things from the earth, or as ever flowing (aei pei), or because the flux of the air is wind, and the poets call the winds "air-blasts," (aetai) ; he who uses the term may mean, so to speak, air-flux (aetorroun), in the sense of wind-flux (pneumatorroun) ; and because this moving wind may be expressed by either term he employs the word air (aer = aetes rheo). Aither (aether) I should interpret as aeitheer ; this may be correctly said, because this element is always running in a flux about the air (aei thei peri tou aera ron). The meaning of the word ge (earth) comes out better when in the form of gaia, for the earth may be truly called "mother" (gaia, genneteira), as in the language of Homer (Od. ix. 118 ; xiii. 160) gegaasi means gegennesthai. CRATYLUS