Medicine & BodyGreek → English
Ophthalmology
/ˌɒfθælˈmɒlədʒi/noun
The branch of medicine dealing with the eye and its diseases.
The Greek roots
ὀφθαλμός
ophthalmós
eye
-λογία
-logía
study of
Literally: “study of the eye”
The story of the word
The spelling trap is Greek: phth, three consonants in a row, straight from ὀφθαλμός. Where that Greek word itself came from is unsettled, though a connection with ὄπωπα, I have seen, is often proposed. The speciality only became practicable in 1851, when Helmholtz built the ophthalmoscope and doctors could for the first time look through a living pupil at the retina behind it.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → New Latin → English
- First recorded
- 19th century
Same family
ophthalmoscopeexophthalmosopticmyopia
In a sentence
She left general surgery for ophthalmology after her first cataract list.