Medicine & BodyGreek → English
Endorphin
/ɛnˈdɔːfɪn/noun
Any of the peptides the body produces that relieve pain and lift mood by acting on opioid receptors.
The Greek roots
ἔνδον
éndon
within, inside
μορφή
morphḗ
form, shape
Literally: “inner shape-giver”
The story of the word
A blend, coined in 1975, of endogenous morphine: the body's own morphine. Morphine had been named for Morpheus, the Greek god who shapes the figures that appear in dreams, whose own name comes from morphē, form. So the runner's high is described, at two removes, by a god of sleep. Metamorphosis and amorphous share the second root.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → scientific coinage → English
- First recorded
- 1975
Same family
morphinemetamorphosisamorphousendoscope
In a sentence
The endorphins hit somewhere around the fourth mile and the pain stopped mattering.