Earth & SkyGreek → English
Heliocentric
/ˌhiːlioʊˈsɛntrɪk/adjective
Taking the sun, rather than the earth, as the centre of the solar system.
The Greek roots
ἥλιος
hḗlios
sun
κέντρον
kéntron
centre, point
Literally: “sun-centred”
The story of the word
Aristarchus of Samos put the sun at the centre in the third century BC and was ignored for eighteen hundred years. The word is far younger, English from the 1680s, made to describe the Copernican model after the argument was effectively over. κέντρον first meant a goad for driving oxen, then the sharp leg of a pair of compasses, and only then the centre it stood on.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → Modern Latin → English
- First recorded
- 17th century
Same family
geocentricperihelionheliumeccentric
In a sentence
Once you accept a heliocentric system, the backward loops of Mars stop needing an explanation.