The etymology of science and engineering – Part II

Heritage UOM life 2 February 2023

Word up!

We recently brought you part one of our look into the fascinating origins of words associated with the Faculty of Science and Engineering – and now we’re back for part two.

Inspired – you may recall – by popular podcast Something Rhymes with Purple, we set out to learn more about the histories and meanings of words linked to our Faculty and, in particular, the names of our Departments.

So, we pick up the purple baton once more and enter the exciting – and often surprising – world of science and engineering etymology…

Bright sparks

You would be forgiven for assuming the word ‘electrical’ – forming, of course, part of the name of our Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering – would be a relatively new word. I know we did.

After all, many people attribute the ‘invention’ of electricity to Benjamin Franklin and his famous kite-flying experiments of 1752. And, it wasn’t until the end of the Victorian period that electricity was more widely introduced into people’s homes. Perhaps unsurprisingly, there remains much debate around the invention of electricity – and whether it could be ‘invented’ or ‘discovered’ at all.

The word ‘electrical’ can actually be traced back to the Ancient Greek word for ‘amber’ – ‘elektron’ – and may have come from the Phoenician word ‘elēkrŏn’, meaning ‘shining light’. The amber part is significant – back in antiquity people knew that if you rubbed amber against certain substances, other light substances would be attracted to it (think of rubbing a balloon on your head and sticking it to your jumper!).

Such electrical phenomena has been known for a long time, but it’s only (relatively) recently that use of electricity, as we know and depend on it today, has been widespread.

The origin of the term ‘electronic’, meanwhile, relates more specifically to the study of electron behaviour and movement – with its first known use in 1902.

2 + 2 = 5

Moving on to the Department of Mathematics and it’s back to Ancient Greece with the word ‘mathema’, which means ‘what one gets to know’ or ‘that which is learnt’.

It was used by the Pythagoreans – founded by, you guessed it, Pythagoras – to coin the term ‘mathematics’ in the 6th century BC. This was when the study of mathematics as a demonstrative discipline first began.

Interestingly, not a great deal is known about Pythagoras or the Pythagoreans, despite the name being recognisable to many.

That renown, of course – and if you can remember from school days – is thanks to Pythagoras’ theorem, which states that for all right-angled triangles, ‘the square on the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of the squares on the other two sides’. Ah yes, that’s right!

Mum’s the word

Next up, the Department of Materials. The Latin root word for ‘materials – ‘matr’ – means ‘mother’ (in the sense of ‘source’) and, interestingly, is also the word origin of ‘matriarch’ and ‘matter’.

The Latin word ‘materia’ links to ‘wood’ and ‘substance’. While ‘material’, as we use it today, relates to goods and substances used to make something, the similar word ‘materiel’ refers more specifically to military equipment.

Good to shed light on the matter!

All Greek to me

Motoring on to the Department of Mechanical, Aerospace and Civil Engineering and the word ‘mechanical’ comes from the Greek ‘mekhana’ (with links also to Middle English, Old French and Latin).

It means ‘trick’ or ‘expedient’ of nature, while the term ‘mech’ also derives from Greek and is linked to ‘instrument’ or ‘tool’. Today, of course, it’s widely used in words such as ‘machinery’ and ‘mechanic’.

We get ‘aerospace’ from the joining of ‘aero’ and ‘space’, deriving from the words ‘aeronautics’ and ‘spacefilght’.

‘Aero’ takes us back to the Ancient Greek ‘aeros’, meaning ‘air’, while the origin of ‘space’ leads us to the Latin word ‘spatium’, which means ‘expanse’ or ‘room’. While ‘space’ today has many meanings, it was first used in reference to ‘outer space’ in the 17th century – in poet John Milton’s epic work Paradise Lost.

Quite fitting, we’d say, that something so huge, so vast, should originate in a work concerning the weighty, biblical story of Adam and Eve, Satan and the Fall of Man!

The Latin root word for ‘civil’ – ‘civilis’ – meanwhile, means both ‘relating to a citizen’ and ‘courteous’, and has associations with the Old English terms ‘hīwen’, meaning ‘household’, and ‘hīrǣden’, meaning ‘family’.

Written in the stars

We’re back to Ancient Greece for the origin of ‘physics’ (Department of Physics and Astronomy), where the word ‘phusis’ meant ‘nature’, or ‘knowledge of nature’.

‘Astronomy’, however, is a little more complex. Its history is entwined with a word that might sound similar, but the meaning of which – today, at least – is very different: ‘astrology’.

Both share Greek roots with the prefix ‘astro’, meaning ‘star’. But while the suffix ‘ology’ in ‘astrology’ – the belief system claiming human affairs correlate with the positions of celestial objects, perhaps most commonly associated with the reading of horoscopes – refers to ‘study of’, the suffix ‘onomy’ means ‘management’ or ‘measurement’.

It’s also found in words such as ‘economy’ and ‘gastronomy’, and relates to the ‘ordering’, ‘arranging’ or, indeed, ‘management’ of the stars. Pretty neat, huh?

Word to the wise

And that, rather neatly, brings us to the end of our dissection of science and engineering etymology.

It’s fascinating – and important – to consider the origins of the subjects we study and the topics we research.

After all, the past has helped shape the present, and what we learn and discover today will shape the future… a future yet to be written.

Words: Joe Shervin
Images: The University of Manchester, Shutterstock

Be sure to subscribe on our homepage to keep up to date with all the latest posts from The Hub.

Aerospace EngineeringCivil EngineeringElectrical and Electronic EngineeringMaterials Science and TextilesMathematicsMechanical EngineeringPhysics and Astronomy