Myth & LegendGreek → English
Chthonic
/ˈθɒnɪk/adjective
Belonging to the underworld or to the gods beneath the earth.
The Greek roots
χθών
khthṓn
earth, ground, soil
Literally: “of the ground”
Follow a root:χθών1 word
The story of the word
Greek religion split its gods in two and treated them differently. Olympians got daylight, a raised altar and smoke rising; chthonic powers such as Hades, Persephone and Hecate got night, a pit dug in the ground and blood poured downward into it. χθών is earth as ground and depth, where γῆ is earth as land and territory. The English spelling preserves a cluster no English speaker attempts.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → English
- First recorded
- 19th century
Same family
autochthonouschthonian
In a sentence
The shrine was chthonic, a pit rather than a platform.
Critics call his novels chthonic, which mostly means dark and full of caves.