Earth & SkyGreek → English
Opal
/ˈoʊpəl/noun
A hydrated silica gemstone that flashes shifting colours as it moves in the light.
The Greek roots
ὀπάλλιος
opállios
opal
Literally: “stone”
Follow a root:ὀπάλλιος1 word
The story of the word
The stone travelled further than most words. Sanskrit upala meant simply 'stone'; Greek made ὀπάλλιος of it, Latin opalus, and English had opal by the end of the sixteenth century. Pliny describes the fire inside it as every other gem's colour gathered into one, which is roughly what a gemmologist says today with different vocabulary.
- How it travelled
- Sanskrit → Ancient Greek → Latin → French → English
- First recorded
- 16th century
Same family
opalescentopaline
In a sentence
The opal looked grey until she turned it, and then it went green and orange.