Myth & LegendGreek → English
Homeric
/hoʊˈmɛrɪk/adjective
Belonging to Homer or his poems, and by extension enormous in scale.
The Greek roots
Ὅμηρος
Hómēros
Homer
Literally: “of Homer”
Follow a root:Ὅμηρος2 words
The story of the word
Homeric laughter is a specific thing: the unquenchable laughter of the gods in the first book of the Iliad, when they watch the lame smith Hephaestus bustling round as cupbearer. The adjective now covers size as much as authorship, hence a Homeric appetite and a Homeric row. Whether a single poet named Ὅμηρος existed has been argued since antiquity, and the name itself has been read as hostage and as he who fits together, neither reading convincing anyone for long.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → Latin → English
Same family
HomerHomeristIliad
In a sentence
The argument over the parking space reached Homeric proportions by Sunday.
Homeric formulas like rosy-fingered dawn were built for a singer working without a text.