Medicine & BodyGreek → English
Sciatic
/saɪˈætɪk/adjective
Relating to the hip, or to the large nerve running down the back of the leg.
The Greek roots
ἰσχίον
ischíon
hip joint, hip socket
Literally: “of the hip”
Follow a root:ἰσχίον5 words
The story of the word
Greek ἰσχιαδικός meant suffering in the hip, from ἰσχίον, the hip socket. Late Latin mangled it into sciaticus, and the mangled form is the one that stuck in English and French while anatomists kept ischium for the bone. The nerve is the thickest in the body, running from the lower spine to the foot, which is why a disc pressing on its roots is felt in the calf rather than the back.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → Late Latin → Old French → English
- First recorded
- 14th century
The same roots elsewhere
Other languages reached for exactly the same Greek pieces.
Same family
sciaticaischium
In a sentence
Sitting on a wallet all day can irritate the sciatic nerve.