hypostasis

The story

1. Ancient Greek · derived fromὑπόστασις“sediment, foundation; substance, existence, essence”
2. Ecclesiastical Latin · borrowed fromhypostasis
3. English todayhypostasis

From Ecclesiastical Latin hypostasis, from Ancient Greek ὑπόστασις (hupóstasis, “sediment, foundation; substance, existence, essence”), from ὑπό (hupó, “under”) + στάσις (stásis, “standing”). Morphologically hypo- + -stasis.

First known use, by meaning

• from 14th c. A sedimentary deposit, especially in urine.
• from 16th c. The essential person, specifically the single person of Christ (as distinguished from his ‘nature(s)’, human and divine), or of the three ‘persons’ of the Trinity (sharing a single ‘essence’).
• from 17th c. The underlying reality or substance of something.
• from 17th c. A relationship between a name and a known quantity, as a cultural personification (i.e. objectification with personality) of an entity or quality.
• from 17th c. Referring to the hypostatic model of personality; i.e., asserting that humans present themselves in many different aspects or hypostases, depending on the internal and external realities they relate to, including different approaches to the study of personality.
• from 20th c. The effect of one gene preventing another from expressing.