Number & MeasureGreek → English
Perimeter
/pəˈrɪmɪtər/noun
The continuous boundary of a shape or area, or its total length.
The Greek roots
περί
perí
around
μέτρον
métron
measure
Literally: “measure around”
The story of the word
περίμετρος did duty for the circumference of a circle and the boundary of a polygon alike, since both are the measure taken around. English borrowed it as a geometrical term in the early fifteenth century and left it there for five hundred years. The military and security sense, a perimeter to be held or breached, is twentieth century, and the two meanings now rarely meet in the same sentence.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → Latin → English
- First recorded
- 15th century
The same roots elsewhere
Other languages reached for exactly the same Greek pieces.
Same family
diametergeometrymetricisometric
In a sentence
Add the four sides and you have the perimeter; that is the whole trick.