Medicine & BodyGreek → English
Staphylococcus
/ˌstæfɪləʊˈkɒkəs/noun
A genus of spherical bacteria that grow in irregular clusters and cause boils, wound infections and food poisoning.
The Greek roots
σταφυλή
staphylḗ
bunch of grapes
κόκκος
kókkos
grain, berry
Literally: “grape-cluster berry”
The story of the word
The Scottish surgeon Alexander Ogston named it in 1882 after looking down a microscope at pus from an abscess and seeing what he described as bunches of grapes. Streptococcus got its name the same way, from στρεπτός, twisted, because those cells form chains instead. The naming convention is purely visual: shape first, disease later.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → scientific coinage → English
- First recorded
- 1882
Same family
streptococcusgonococcusstaphyloma
In a sentence
The swab came back positive for staphylococcus, so she was put on a different antibiotic.