Meanings
plural hypates
- musical pitchIn ancient musical theory, the lowest-pitched fixed note in the nearer tetrachord on a lyre, always pitched a perfect fourth below the mese, with two movable notes between them, the parhypate (lower in pitch) and the lichanos (higher in pitch).
Origin
- Ancient Greekὑπάτη
- Latinhypatē
- Englishhypate
Unadapted borrowing from Latin hypatē, from Ancient Greek ὑπάτη (hupátē, literally “highest/nearest [string]”). The hypate was the "highest" in the sense of being the string on a lyre nearest the player and physically above the remaining strings (compare a modern guitar, where the low E string is nearest the player), but actually the lowest in pitch.
More words from Latin, Ancient Greek
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
hypate. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/hypate
“hypate.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/hypate. Accessed November 3, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “hypate,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/hypate.
Source: hypate on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.