Politics & SocietyGreek → English
Polygamy
/pəˈlɪɡəmi/noun
The practice of having more than one spouse at the same time.
The Greek roots
πολύς
polýs
many
γάμος
gámos
marriage
Literally: “many marriages”
The story of the word
Later Greek had πολυγαμία for the state of being married to several people, and English theologians reached for it in the 16th century while arguing about the patriarchs of the Old Testament. Lawyers and anthropologists have kept it ever since, with polygyny and polyandry added later for precision. Botany uses the same γάμος quite differently: a cryptogam is a plant whose marriage, meaning its reproduction, is hidden from view.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → Late Latin → French → English
- First recorded
- 16th century
Same family
monogamybigamycryptogampolygon
In a sentence
The commission spent a year on how inheritance law should handle polygamy.