Myth & LegendGreek → English
Pallas
/ˈpaləs/noun
A cult title of Athena, and the name of the second asteroid discovered, found by Heinrich Olbers in 1802.
The Greek roots
Παλλάς
Pallás
Pallas, epithet of Athena
Literally: “Pallas”
Follow a root:Παλλάς2 words
The story of the word
Ancient writers could not agree on the epithet either. One story makes Pallas a childhood companion of Athena whom she killed by accident and mourned by taking her name; another links it to πάλλειν, to brandish, as of a spear. The Palladium, the wooden image whose safety guaranteed Troy, is named from it, which is how a modern insurance company borrowed the idea. The element palladium was named in 1803 after the freshly discovered asteroid, not after the goddess directly.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → Latin → English
- First recorded
- 1802
Same family
palladiumPalladian
In a sentence
Pallas has an unusually steep orbital inclination for a large asteroid.
Homer calls her Pallas Athena far more often than Athena alone.