Etymology

polyatomic

P3O1L1Y4A1T1O1M3I1C3

Today it means: (of a molecule or ion) Consisting of two or more atoms. Full definition →

English atomic ← Ancient Greek πολῠ́ς (polŭ́s) ← Proto-Indo-European *polh₁ús
Ask AI about its historyChatGPTClaudePerplexityGoogle AIGrok

The story

  1. Proto-Indo-European*pleh₁-
  2. Proto-Indo-European*polh₁ús
  3. Ancient Greekπολῠ́ς (polŭ́s)
  4. Englishpoly-
  5. Englishatomic
  6. English todaypolyatomic

From poly- + atomic.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.