Etymology

centroid

C3E1N1T1R1O1I1D2

Today it means: The point at which gravitational force (or other universally and uniformly acting force) may be supposed to act on a given rigid, uniformly dense body; the centre of gravity or centre of mass. Full definition →

Ask AI about its historyChatGPTClaudePerplexityGoogle AIGrok

The story

From centre + -oid. From 1844, used as a replacement for the older terms "centre of gravity" and "centre of mass" in situations described in purely geometrical terms, and subsequently used for further generalisations.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.