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I didn’t realise so many of these medical terms were Greek rather than Latin. Interesting! Are these terms still used as-is in modern Greek? Much like how tran
by xanderlewis 2y ago
I didn’t realise so many of these medical terms were Greek rather than Latin. Interesting!
Are these terms still used as-is in modern Greek? Much like how translating names of French dishes removes some of the air of sophistication, I feel like being told one is to receive a ‘skull cut’ sounds somewhat more scary than the (to an English speaker) academic-sounding ‘craniotomy’.
- pygy_ 2y agoAnatomy derives from Latin. Physiology, pathophysiology and operational terms derive from Greek.
- mananaysiempre 2y agoAmusingly, the word anatomy (“dissection”) is from Greek via Latin, from the very same root that we’re discussing here. Other English terms from the Greek root for “cut”: tomography (imaging through a lot of cross-sections); entomology (study of in-sects, critters with sect-ions in their bodies); dichotomy (division into two possibilities); atom (that which cannot be divided).
- weebull 2y agoI was going to ask "What's an Ana and why are we cutting it?"
- mananaysiempre 2y ago“Up” or “thoroughly”, apparently? Same prefix as in analysis, anaphora, anamorphism. Ancient Greek had a sprawling system of prefixes that one can’t really pick up by osmosis, it seems. (Complaints about noun morphology sound a bit hypocritical from a native speaker of Russian, I know, but it is what it is.)
- leansensei 2y agoSame Ana as in Analysis, anaphylactic, anamorphic...
- persedes 2y agomy latin teacher would always go on about how romans just copied the greek language (and more etc etc).
- HPsquared 2y agoDoctors speak Greek; lawyers speak Latin.
- xanderlewis 2y agoAnd yet it's all Greek to most.