Mind & EmotionGreek → English
Psychotherapy
/ˌsaɪkoʊˈθɛrəpi/noun
The treatment of mental and emotional difficulty through structured conversation.
The Greek roots
ψυχή
psykhḗ
breath, soul, mind
θεραπεία
therapeía
attendance, service, cure
Literally: “attendance on the soul”
The story of the word
θεραπεία in Greek meant waiting on someone, the work of a servant or an attendant, and only sideways did it come to mean medical care. The compound is Victorian: Daniel Hack Tuke wrote of psycho-therapeutics in 1872, arguing that the mind could act on the body, well before Freud made the practice a profession. ψυχή started as the breath that leaves at death, which is why it also names a butterfly in Greek.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → scientific coinage → English
- First recorded
- late 19th century
Same family
psychologypsychiatrytherapytherapeutic
In a sentence
Six months of psychotherapy did more for his sleep than any of the pills had.