Everyday LifeGreek → English
Gyro
/ˈjiːroʊ/noun
Meat roasted on a vertical spit and served in flatbread with salad and sauce.
The Greek roots
γύρος
gýros
circle, turn
Literally: “turn”
Follow a root:γῦρος3 words
The story of the word
The food is named for the spit it turns on, and the Greek word is a straight translation of Turkish döner, which also means turning. Greek restaurants in New York put it on menus in the early 1970s and Americans have been arguing about the pronunciation since. The same root spins through gyroscope, gyre and autogyro.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → Modern Greek → English
- First recorded
- 1970s
Same family
gyroscopegyregyrate
In a sentence
We ate gyros standing up outside the shop because there was nowhere to sit.