Earth & SkyGreek → English
Pluto
/ˈpluːtoʊ/noun
A dwarf planet beyond Neptune, counted as the ninth planet from 1930 until 2006.
The Greek roots
Πλούτων
Ploútōn
god of the underworld
πλοῦτος
ploûtos
wealth, riches
Literally: “the wealthy one”
The story of the word
Venetia Burney, eleven years old and in Oxford, suggested the name over breakfast in 1930; her grandfather sent it on to the Lowell Observatory. The first two letters also carry the initials of Percival Lowell, whose search had led to the discovery. Greeks used Plouton partly to avoid saying Hades out loud, and partly because everything valuable underground, grain and silver alike, was his.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → Latin → English
- First recorded
- 1930
Same family
plutocracyplutoniumplutonic
In a sentence
Pluto takes 248 years to circle the Sun, so nobody alive has seen it finish a lap.