Etymology

tetrachromacy

T1E1T1R1A1C3H4R1O1M3A1C3Y4

Today it means: The quality of having four independent channels for conveying color information in the eye. Full definition →

English chromo- ← Ancient Greek χρῶμᾰ (khrômă) ← Proto-Hellenic *kʰrṓwmə
Ask AI about its historyChatGPTClaudePerplexityGoogle AIGrok

The story

  1. Proto-Indo-European*kʷetwóres
  2. Proto-Hellenic*kʷétwores
  3. Ancient Greekτέσσᾰρες (téssăres)
  4. Ancient Greekτετρᾰ- (tetră-)
  5. Englishtetra-
  6. Proto-Hellenic*kʰrṓwmə
  7. Ancient Greekχρῶμᾰ (khrômă)
  8. Englishchromo-
  9. English todaytetrachromacy

From tetra- + chromo- + -acy.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.