Etymology

Confucius

Con·fu·cius
C3O1N1F4U1C3I1U1S1

Today it means: An influential Chinese philosopher who lived c. 551 BCE – c. 479 BCE; personal name Kong Qiu (孔丘). Full definition →

New Latin Cōnfucius
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The story

  1. New Latin · learned borrowing fromCōnfucius
  2. New Latin · learned borrowing fromCōnfucius
  3. English todayConfucius

Learned borrowing from New Latin Cōnfucius, from Mandarin 孔夫子 (Kǒng Fūzǐ, honorific title, literally “Master Kong”) + Latin -ius.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.