Greek Language

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Can someone define a word that they have never seen or heard before? Through the study of etymology and knowledge of the Greek language, this feat becomes possible. The Greek language has been a major influence on hundreds of languages throughout the course of time. The English language alone has approximately 12% of its words derived from Greek. (Overview) The root bio, found in words like biography, antibiotic, and biosphere, is just one example of these thousands of words extracted from Greek. Bios has a Greek origin and can be defined as “manner of life” or “simple life”. What is the Greek language? Dating all the way back to the thirteenth century BCE, the Greek language has long been the prominent language (Greek). Its 24 letters have …show more content…

It is believed to be derived from the Latin word biographia or late Greek word biographia meaning “description of life” (Online). Today the word is most commonly defined as “the story of a real person’s life written by someone other than that person” (Marium). How could someone know this without researching the Greek and Latin languages? The answer could be found through of etymology, or the study of the true meaning of words. Biography can break-down into bio and graphy. Bio means “life” and graphy means “written account” or “drawing”. This could give the rough definition “written account of a life”. Many words can be broken-down and defined through this process. Antibiotic is another word that contains the root bio but shows how different prefixes and suffixes can greatly alter a word's meaning. The medical definition for antibiotic is “a drug that is used to kill harmful bacteria and to cure infections”. (Merriam) However it can be broken into anti meaning “against” and biotic meaning “pertaining to life”. Against life? As simple as it sounds, it is correct. An antibiotic fights against microorganisms or small forms of life such as …show more content…

Bios means “life” and sphaira means “sphere”. The dictionary definition would say that a biosphere is “the part of earth’s crust, waters, and atmosphere that supports life” (Merriam). It makes sense that the earth, simply put, is a sphere of life. The word is not as old as the planet itself due to the fact that it was not discovered until the late 16th and early 17th century that the world was not flat (Who). Through time and discovering this word and many others developed and changed to fit the ever changing knowledge of mankind and the world in which they

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