Myth & LegendGreek → English
Apollo
/əˈpɑːloʊ/proper noun
The Greek and Roman god of light, prophecy, music, healing and plague, and the name of the American programme that landed people on the Moon.
The Greek roots
Ἀπόλλων
Apóllōn
the god Apollo
Literally: “Apollo, sense disputed since antiquity”
Follow a root:Ἀπόλλων2 words
The story of the word
Ancient writers already argued about the name. Aeschylus punned it against ἀπόλλυμι, to destroy, since Apollo's arrows brought the plague as readily as the cure; others linked it to ἀπέλλα, a Dorian assembly, and some modern scholars look to an Anatolian source instead. Abe Silverstein picked the name at NASA in 1960, thinking of the god driving his chariot across the sky.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → Latin → English
Same family
ApollonianApollyon
In a sentence
Apollo 11 lifted off with a computer weaker than a pocket calculator.