Yes, generally any source to byte-code translator is a compiler. The byte-code then can either be interpreted or compiled, too. Since the default CPython implem

Yes, generally any source to byte-code translator is a compiler. The byte-code then can either be interpreted or compiled, too. Since the default CPython implementation interpreted the byte code, it was said it's an interpreter - but strictly speaking it is not. Originally interpreters were implementations which execute source code - which in Lisp is widely available. For example SBCL for a long time only had a native code AOT compiler, but now also includes s-expressions. Famous is also the Lisp interpreter in Lisp from McCarthy, where he defined the core language in itself. See the paper from Paul Graham about that: http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/myl/llog/jmc.pdf http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/myl/llog/jmc.pdf That's a very primitive Lisp interpreter - many real ones are implemented in C, Assembler... Just be aware, that in the Lisp world 'Interpreter' means something very specific: an interpreter of the source language.