My favorite greek words and their meaning
Last Updated on 19/10/2023
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Words hold the power of their history and their culture and in this post, I share my eleven favorite Greek words and their meaning. It is great to feel the magic of knowing the right word and its meaning from the people that had created it. That’s why I really love to read and learn new words, even from languages I don’t actually speak like Latin. I hope to find them interesting and share your favorite words in the comments.
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My favorite Greek words and their meaning
Psyche
It is the totality of the human mind, conscious and unconscious. The basic meaning of this ancient Greek word was “life” in the sense of “breath”. The ancient Greek verb means to blow.
Kairos
(n.) It means the right or opportune moment. It signifies a period or season, a moment of indeterminate time in which an event of significance happens (Source: Wikipedia). Ancient Greeks used two words for time. The word “Chronos” is quantitative. And, the word “kairos” has a qualitative, permanent nature. And, in modern Greek it also means weather.
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Eunoia
(n.) In modern Greek, it means favor or grace. In rhetoric, eunoia is the goodwill a speaker cultivates between himself/herself and his/her audience, a condition of receptivity. It comes from the Greek word εὔνοια, which means “well mind” or “beautiful thinking“.
Orphic
(n.) It means something mysterious and entrancing, beyond ordinary understanding.
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Nephele
(n.) It means a small cloud. Moreover, Aristophanes also used it in the plural to describe ideas. There is the title of his most interesting comedy of all, Nephelae. In addition, it is the first name of the mythical cloud nymph Nephele.
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Catharsis
(n.) Catharsis means purification or cleansing. Α therapeutic technique to relieve tension, especially through art and music. Aristotle originally used catharsis in Poetics as a metaphor. He compares the effects of tragedy on the mind of a spectator to the effect of a cathartic on the body. Any release of emotional tension.
Sophrosyne
(n.) It is an ancient Greek concept of an ideal of excellence of character and soundness of mind. One well-balanced individual leads to other qualities, such as temperance, moderation, prudence, purity, and self-control.
According to Plato and his Socratic dialogue “Gorgias”, people have sophrosyne when they are “masters of themselves” and control themselves and their passions. Also, he considers sophrosyne to have the right opinion of themselves and do what is appropriate for them without neglecting public affairs and laws. Moreover, Aristotle wrote about sophrosyne that it’s a virtue to do the right things and hold one’s desires.
In other languages, there is no single word that is a simple equivalent. It is sometimes translated into English as prudence, self-control, moderation, or temperance.
Meraki
(n.) It’s the soul, and creativity, soul to put in something, the essence of yourself that you put into your work and creations.
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More favorite Greek words and their meaning
Metanoia
(n. ) Metanoia means the journey of changing one’s mind, heart, self, or way of life. In rhetoric, it is a correction, a rhetorical device. In theology, it means repentance. And, in psychology, the process of experiencing a psychotic “breakdown” and subsequent, positive psychological re-building or “healing”.
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Nostos
(n.) In Greek literature is about returning home by the sea after an extensive journey. It includes a shipwreck in an unknown location. Certain trials test an epic hero and push him to show a high level of heroism or greatness. So, the return isn’t just about returning home physically but also about retaining certain statuses and retaining your identity upon arrival. Nostos is the theme in Homer’s The Odyssey, where the main hero Odysseus tries to return home after battling in the Trojan War.
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Ataraxia
(n.) According to the ancient Grek author Empiricus, it is an untroubled and tranquil condition of the soul. Philosophers Pyrrho and Epicurus used the Greek term for a lucid state of robust equanimity. Its characteristic is ongoing freedom from distress and worry.
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Eudaimonia
(n.) It is a Greek word commonly translated as happiness or welfare. Moreover, “human flourishing” has been proposed as a more accurate translation. Etymologically, it consists of the words good and spirit (in Greek, “eu” and “daimōn“). According to philosopher Aristotle, eudaimonia is the highest human good, and so it is the aim of practical philosophy.
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Peripeteia
(n.) It is a reversal of circumstances or a turning point. Well, according to philosopher Aristotle, peripeteia is “a change by which the action veers round to its opposite, subject always to our rule of probability or necessity.” Peripeteia, along with discovery, is the most effective when it comes to drama, particularly in a tragedy.
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Alexithymia
(n.) It is the inability to describe emotions verbally, with words.
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