Language Matters | How on Earth did our planet get its name? Not from a Greek or Roman deity, that’s for sure
Earth is an anomaly in our solar system in that it is not named after a Greco-Roman god or goddess
April 22 is Earth Day. The English name, from the 15th century, for the planet we inhabit came from the Old English eorþe, meaning both “ground, soil, dirt, dry land; country, district” and “the material world, the abode of man”, which descended from the Proto-Germanic erþ ō, from the Proto-Indo-European root er- (“earth”, “ground”).
Earth is the only planet in our solar system not named after a Greco-Roman deity. The name used in Western academia during the Renaissance was Tellus Mater or Terra Mater, the Latin for “earth mother”, i.e. “Mother Earth”, goddess of the earth in ancient Roman religion and mythology. From the Latin terra – with origins in the Proto-Indo-European ters-, meaning “dry” – the Romance languages derived their word for Earth, including the French La Terre, Italian La Terra and Spanish La Tierra.
Numerous English words are formed from the root terra, either directly from Latin, such as terra firma, terrestrial and territory, or via languages such as French – terrace, for instance. The Roman goddess’ Greek counterpart is Gaia, from the Ancient Greek Γαῖα, a poetic form of Γῆ Gē (“land, earth”), from which English developed its geo- prefix, as in geography and geology.
While the Gaia hypothesis – that the biosphere acts like a living organism that self-regulates to keep conditions optimal for life – is controversial, it cannot be denied that our actions have an environmental impact
Other languages also derive their name for Earth from words to do with the land. The Sanskrit for “soil, ground” developed into bhūmi in Dravidian languages such as Malayalam and Telegu, and bumi in Indonesian. The Japanese chikyū and Korean jigu are based on the Chinese Mandarin (dìqiú; “ground” + “ball”).
With the advent of space flight, though, our perception of Earth has altered. Based on images of the planet taken from space – showing a sphere of cloud-swirled blue ocean broken up by green-brown continents – we now think of Earth as The Blue Marble (the photograph taken by the crew of the Apollo 17 spacecraft in 1972), a cosmic blue pearl and Pale Blue Dot (coined by astronomer Carl Sagan, who was inspired by the Voyager 1 space probe’s image in 1990).
While the Gaia hypothesis – that the biosphere acts like a living organism that self-regulates to keep conditions optimal for life – is controversial, it cannot be denied that our actions have an environmental impact. On Earth Day, let’s pledge to live more sustainable lifestyles.
