Everyday LifeGreek → English
Dorian
/ˈdɔːriən/adjective
Relating to the Doric-speaking Greeks, and the name of a musical mode and of a male given name.
The Greek roots
Δώριος
Dṓrios
of the Dorians
Literally: “of the Dorians”
Follow a root:Δώριος1 word
The story of the word
The Dorians are the Greek speakers who ended up in Sparta, Corinth, Crete and Syracuse, and the plain heavy Doric column is named for their building. The medieval Dorian mode is not the ancient one: ninth-century theorists misread their Greek sources and pinned the old names onto different scales, so what a jazz player calls Dorian would have puzzled Aristoxenus. Wilde gave the name to Dorian Gray for its associations, and he knew precisely which ones.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → Latin → English
- First recorded
- 16th century
In a sentence
Raise the sixth and the minor scale turns Dorian, which is most of the sound of English folk song.