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Info provided by Pedro Ortiz Valdivieso is
absolutely right.
<"Actually, the Greek verb is enkykleomai
which means 'I encircle'.
<The adjective enkyklios has several meanings including 'circular' (for <example, in the sense of encyclical letters) ; from that adjective, the <feminine form (enkyklia) was applied to a genus, transforming it into a <feminine substantive." In addition to the above I
should submit the following information.
Adjectives in ancient as well as in modern Greek
has always three genders:
masculine, feminine and neuter. In the specific
case of the adjective enkyklios
the masculine and the feminine gender are
the same (enkyklios) and the neuter
form is (enkyklion). The person who was inspired
from this word in order to name
the new genus should be aware of this ambivalance
so he tranformed the genus
name in enkyklia-encyclia. Adding an "a" at
the end of his word he is specifying
that the new name is specifically feminine since
"a" is a specific feminine ending in Greek
and there is no masculine or neuter word ending
in "a". So his intention is clear that
encyclia is with no confusion a feminine
word.
Pandelis Vlahopoulos
Athens Greece
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