1.1. Etymology and Concept

With related terms in other languages, the word “free” derives from the Indo-European root *prai-, meaning “protect, spare, like, love.” The Latin word ¶ for “freedom” is libertas, the Greek, eleutheria (esp. in the sense of political freedom). The latter occurred for the first time in Pindar (ca. 522-ca. 438), who said of Hieron I (ca. 540–467/466), founder of the city of Etna, that he founded it “with ordered freedom” (Pyth. 1.61). The eleutheroi were free persons who, a…