eheu

Expressive; compare heu (“alas!”), and Sanskrit अहो (aho). Because of the latter comparison a Proto-Indo-European origin was traditionally assumed.

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): [ˈeː.(ɦ)ɛu̯]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): [ˈɛː.eu̯]

ēheu

1. expression of pain; alas!
   • [1942, Robert Frost, “The Lesson for Today”, in A Witness Tree (in English):

     I can just hear you call your Palace class: / Come learn the Latin Eheu for alas.]

   • c. 84 BCE – 54 BCE, Catullus, 64:

     Quem procul ex algā maestīs Mīnōis ocellīs
     saxea ut effigiēs bacchantis prōspicit, ēheu,
     prōspicit et magnīs cūrārum fluctuat undīs.

     Whom the Minoan one far off from the seaweed with sorrowful little eyes,
     She stony as a statue of Bacchus, looks forth, alas,
     She looks forth and rages with great waves of cares,

   • 65 BCE – 8 BCE, Horace, 2.14:

     Eheu fugace, Postume, Postume
     labuntur anni nec pietas moram
     rugis et instanti senectae
     adferet indomitaeque morti

     Alas, my Postumus, the fleeting years
     Will fall away, nor will piety cause
     Delay to wrinkles or to advancing
     Old age or to indomitable death.

   • 43 BCE – c. 17 CE, Ovid, Metamorphoses Book 4:

     quotiensque puer miserabilis "eheu"
     dixerat, haec resonis iterabat vocibus "eheu"

     and as often as the poor boy says "Alas!"
     again with answering utterance she cries "Alas!"

• “eheu”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “eheu”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• eheu in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.