Horology
/hɒˈrɒlədʒi/noun
The measurement of time and the making of clocks.
The Greek roots
Literally: “study of hours”
The story of the word
ὥρα began as a season or the right moment, and the Ὧραι were goddesses of the seasons before anyone counted hours; fruit picked at the right time was ὡραῖος, which drifted into meaning beautiful and is still the ordinary Greek word for lovely. Equal hours came late, out of Egyptian and Hellenistic astronomy, because a daylight hour defined as a twelfth of the day is much longer in June than in December. The horoscope is a close relative: ὡροσκόπος, the hour-watcher, the sign observed rising at the moment of a birth.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → Latin → English
- First recorded
- 19th century
Same family
In a sentence
He came to horology through a broken carriage clock and never got out.
The society's horology collection includes three marine chronometers that still keep time.