Politics & SocietyGreek → English
Pentarchy
/ˈpɛntɑːki/noun
Government by five rulers, and the arrangement of the five ancient patriarchal sees.
The Greek roots
πέντε
pénte
five
ἀρχή
archḗ
rule, beginning
Literally: “rule of five”
The story of the word
Justinian's legislation shaped the church version: Rome, Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem, ranked in that order, with authority meant to be shared among them. The schism of 1054 broke it and nothing has replaced it. Historians reuse the word for the five great powers who ran nineteenth-century Europe after Vienna. Archē carried both beginning and rule, which is how archaic and monarchy come to share a syllable.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → English
Same family
monarchyoligarchyanarchypentagon
In a sentence
The council's authority rested on the pentarchy, and once Rome walked out the whole structure lost its balance.