Plants & CreaturesGreek → English
Resin
/ˈrɛzɪn/noun
The sticky secretion of certain trees, and by extension synthetic materials that behave like it.
The Greek roots
ῥητίνη
rhētínē
resin of the pine
Literally: “pine gum”
Follow a root:ῥητίνη2 words
The story of the word
ῥητίνη named the pine's gum, the stuff that sealed wine jars and flavoured the wine inside them, which is where retsina comes from. Latin resina looks borrowed from the Greek, though some argue both come from a common Mediterranean source rather than one from the other. Rosin is the same word worn down through Old French, so a violinist and a polymer chemist reach for two forms of one ancient noun.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → Latin → Old French → English
- First recorded
- 14th century
Same family
rosinretsina
In a sentence
Resin ran down the trunk and set hard in yellow beads.
The kit comes with a two-part resin that cures in twenty minutes.