In the ancient Mediterranean world, the classical compass winds were names for the points of geographic direction and orientation, in association with the winds as conceived of by the ancient Greeks and Romans. Ancient wind roses typically had twelve winds and thus twelve points of orientation, sometimes reduced to eight or increased to twenty-four.
Originally conceived as a branch of meteorology, the classical wind rose had only a tentative relationship with actual navigation. The Classical 12-point wind rose was eventually displaced by the modern compass rose (8-point, 16-point and 32-point), adopted by seafarers during the Middle Ages.
Origins
It is uncertain when or why the human sense of geographic orientation and direction became associated with winds.In a survey of a widely distributed sample of 127 world languages, Brown (1983) finds 18% of the languages have no cardinal points at all, and only 64% have all four cardinal points. Brown finds four sources for cardinal direction: (1) environment-specific features (e.g. landmarks); (2) celestial bodies (esp. the position of the sun); (3) atmospheric features (e.g. winds, temperature) (4) application of generic directions to cardinal directions (e.g. uptown/downtown = north/south). It is probable that for ancient settled populations, local physical landmarks (e.g. mountains, deserts, settlements) were the initial and most immediate markers of general direction ("towards the coast", "towards the hills", "towards the lands of Xanadu", etc.). Astral phenomena, in particular the position of the sun at dawn and dusk, were also used to denote direction.Brown (1983) finds that sunrise-sunset accounts for the west-east cardinal points in 45% of the 127 world languages in his survey – or, perhaps more informatively, c. 60% of those languages which have east-west to begin with.
The association of geographic direction with wind was another source.Brown (1983) finds that winds account for north-south cardinal points in 19% of the world languages in his survey (or 28% of those that have north-south to begin with), but account for less than 2% of the west-east directions – Turkish is one of these few. It was probably farming populations, attentive to rain and temperature for their crops, that noticed the qualitative differences in winds – some were humid, others dry, some hot, others cold – and that these qualities depended on where the wind was blowing from. Local directional names were used to refer to the winds, eventually giving the wind itself a proper name, irrespective of the observer's position. This was likely furthered by sailors who, far from landmarks at sea, nonetheless recognized a particular wind by its qualities and referred to it by a familiar name.Brown (1983) emphasizes the transition to winds as cardinal points as the population becomes more mobile. See also Aczel (2001: p.40) The final step, completing the circle, was to use the proper names of the winds to denote general cardinal directions of the compass rose. This would take a little longer to work itself through.
Biblical
In the Hebrew Bible, there is frequent reference to four cardinal directions.e.g. Genesis 13:14, Gen. 28:14; Deuteronomy 3:27 The names of the directions seem to be associated with physical landmarks for the ancient Israelites living in the region of Judea, e.g. East is referred to as kedem, which may derive from "edom" ("red"), and may be a reference to the color of the rising dawn, or the red sandstone cliffs of the Land of Edom to the east; North is referred to as saphon, from Mount Zaphon on the northern edge of Syria, South is often negev, from the Negev desert to the south, and West is yam ("sea", meaning the Mediterranean Sea).D'Avezac (1874: p.10); Aczel (2001: p.39-40)Mounce, W.D. (2009) Mounce's Complete Expository Dictionary of Old and New Testament Words. Zondervan Orientation seems to be to the East, in the direction of the rising sun, with the result that the terms kedem, saphon and negev became generalized with "facing", "left" and "right" side of anything.
The association of cardinal directions with winds is implied at several places in the Old Testament.Emil G. Hirsch and Immanuel Benzinger, Winds, Jewish Encyclopedia, 1906 "Four winds" are referred to in the Bible in several places.Jeremiah 49:36, Ezekiel 37: 9, Daniel 8.8, Zechariah 2: 6) Kedem (East) is used frequently as the name of a scorching wind that blows from the east.Genesis (41:6), Ezekiel 19:12. It is related to the modern word "kadima", meaning "forward". There are several passages referring to the scattering of people "to all the winds".Ezekiel 5:10
Greek
Unlike the Biblical Israelites, the early Greeks maintained two separate and distinct systems of cardinal directions and winds, at least for a while.d'Avezac (1874: p.11)
Astral phenomena were used to define four cardinal points: arctos (ἄρκτος, "bear", the Ursa Major, for North), anatole (ἀνατολή, "sunrise" or eos "dawn", East), mesembria (μεσημβρία, "noon", South) and dysis (δύσις, "sunset" or hesperus, "evening", West).D'Avezac (1874: 11); Brown (1948: p.144). Heraclitus, in particular, suggests that a meridian drawn between the north (arctos) and its opposite could be used to divide East from West.Heraclitus, fragment 120: ἠοῦς καὶ ἑσπέρας τέρματα ἡ ἄρκτος καί ἀντίον τῆς ἄρκτου οὖρος αἰθρίου Διός (In Diels trans: "The limits of dawn and evening are the Bear and, opposite the Bear, the guardian of bright Zeus.") Homer already spoke of Greeks sailing with Ursa Major (or "Wagon"/"Wain") for orientation.Iliad (18: 489 (Gk, Eng)), Odyssey (5: 275) The identification of the Pole Star (at that time, Kochab in the Ursa MinorTaylor (1957:p.12)) as the better indicator of the North seems to have emerged a little later (it is said Thales introduced this, probably learned from Phoenician seafarers).A.v. Humboldt (1851: v.3, p.160)
Distinct from these cardinal points, the ancient Greeks had four winds (Anemoi). The peoples of early Greece reportedly conceived of only two winds – the winds from the north, known as Boreas (Βορέας), and the winds from the south, known as Notus (Νότος).At least that is claimed by Thrasyalcus of Thasos, as reported by Strabo (I.21). See also Gosselin (1805: xcviii). This should not be surprising, as Brown (1983) finds in his global language survey, winds tend to be far more frequently associated with north-south points than with west-east points (which are primarily sun-driven). But two more winds – Eurus (Εὖρος) from the east and Zephyrus (Ζέφυρος) from the west – were added soon enough.
The etymology of the names of the four archaic Greek winds is uncertain. Among tentative propositions is that Boreas might come from "boros", an old variant of "oros" (Greek for "mountains", which were to the north geographically).E.T. Roe et al., editors, (1907) New American Encyclopaedic Dictionary, p.574. St. Isidore of Seville (c. 620 CE), in his Etymologia, also relates "Boreas" to "mountains" (Lat: p.480; Eng) An alternative hypothesis is that it may come from "boros" meaning "voracious".Valpy (1860: p.26) Another is that it comes from the phrase ἀπὸ τῆς βοῆς ("from the roar"), a reference to its violent and loud noise.Aulus Gellius, Attic Nights, Ch.22 p.146-7 Notos probably comes from "notios" ("moist", a reference to the warm rains and storms brought from the south).Valpy (1860: p.114) Eurus and Zephyrus seem to come from "brightness" (q.v. Eos) and "gloominess" ("zophos") respectively, doubtlessly a reference to sunrise and sunset.C.R.Ward (1894) "Current Notes: Names of the Winds", American Meteorological Journal, Vol. 11, (p.67); Valpy (1860: p.52).
Homer
The archaic Greek poet Homer (c. 800 BC) refers to the four winds by name – Boreas, Eurus, Notos, Zephyrus – in his Odyssey,e.g. Homer, Odyssey, Bk. 5, 295 and in the Iliad.Homer, Iliad: Bk. 2 (145), Bk. 9 (5), Bk. 11 (305), etc. However, at some points, Homer seems to imply two more: a northwest wind and a southwest wind.e.g. a "north and west wind that both blow from Thrace" (Iliad, Bk.9, 5) and the south and west together in the Iliad Bk.11, 306, with the paradoxical "Argestes Notos", read variously as northwest-south wind by some interpreters, or simply a "cloud-clearing" South wind by others. See D'Avezac (1874). Some have taken this to imply that Homer may have had as many as eight winds.e.g. Gosselin (1805: xcviii). However, others remain unconvinced, and insist Homer only had a four wind-rose.e.g. Falconer (1811:p.294), D'Avezac (1874: p.12)
Writing several centuries later, Strabo (c. 10 BC) notes that some contemporaries took Homer's ambiguity to imply that the Homeric system may already anticipate the summer and winter distinction later made famous by Aristotle. This refers to the fact that the "east" (sunrise) and "west" (sunset) are not stable on the horizon, but depend on the season, i.e. during the winter, the sun rises and sets a little further south than in the summer, Consequently, the Homeric system may have had six winds – Boreas (N) and Notos (S) on the meridian axis, and the other four on diagonals: Zephyrus (NW), Eurus (NE), Apeliotes (SE) and Argestes (SW).Strabo, Geography, Bk.1.2.21 p.44. (this translation is confusing. It should read (as translated by I.G. Kidd (1999) in Posidonius, vol.3, Translations of the Fragments, Cambridge University Press, p.196.)
Strabo, quoting Posidonius notes that Homer sometimes used epithets of qualitative attributes to append ordinal directions to the cardinal winds, e.g. as western winds bring rain, then when Homer says a "stormy Boreas" he means a different wind from a "loud Boreas" (i.e. wet north = NW, loud north = N)Strabo Geography, Bk.1.2.21. Aczel (2001: p.42). Nonetheless, while it seems that Homer may have realized that there were more than four winds, he did not use those epithets systematically enough to permit us to conclude that he also embraced a six- or eight-point windrose.D'Avezac (1874: p.12) Other classical writers, e.g. Pliny the Elder, are adamant that Homer mentioned only four winds.Pliny the Elder, Natural History, Bk. II, Ch.46 p.73)
Hesiod (c. 700 BCE) in his Theogony (c. 735) gives the four winds mythical personification as gods, the Anemoi (Ἄνεμοι), the children of the Titan gods Astraeus (stars) and Eos (dawn). But Hesiod himself refers to only three winds by name – Boreas, Notos and Zephyrus – which he called the "good winds" and the "children of the morning" (engendering a little confusion, as it might be read as they were all easterly winds – although curious that Eurus is not among them).Wood (1894: p.78-79); Hesiod does seem to mention Argestes as a fourth; see Theogony, (379) and (870) Hesiod refers to other "bad winds", but not by name.
The Greek physician Hippocrates (c. 400 BC), in his On Airs, Water and Places, refers to four winds, but designates them not by their Homeric names, but rather from the cardinal direction from which they blow (arctos, anatole, dusis, etc.) He does, however, recognize six geographic points – north, south and the summer and winter risings and settings – using the latter to set the boundaries for the four general winds.Hippocrates, On Airs, Waters and Places, refers to the southerly winds as "winds that blow between the winter sunrise and winter sunset" (C.9). Similarly, the northerly winds generally blow between summer sunrise and sunset (c.15), easterly winds blow between summer and winter sunrise (c.22) and westerlies between the summer and winter sunset (c. 25). Brown (1948: p.124) says "Hippocrates said there were six winds, but there is some uncertainty as to where they blew from", but no reference to where exactly it is stated in Hippocrates. Only four general winds are described by Hippocrates, but Brown might be referring to the six stated compass directions (N, S, winter & summer sunsets & sunrises) that form their boundaries.
Aristotle