polyphony

Etymology

It is borrowed from Ancient Greek πολυφωνία (poluphōnía, “variety of tones”),^{[2][3][4][5][6]} a Hellenistic word used of the varied notes of birds and instruments and of speech,^[2] from πολύφωνος (polúphōnos, “having many tones or voices”),^[2][3][4][6] from πολύς (polús, “many”) and φωνή (phōnḗ, “voice, sound”).^[3][4][7] Etymonline traces the first element to Proto-Indo-European *pele- (“to fill”) and the second to *bha- (“to speak, tell, say”).^[3] In later use the OED takes the word as formed from English poly- + -phony,^[2] and it compares Medieval Latin polyphonia, found once in the 14th century in a musical sense.^[2] English had earlier used the form polyphonism (1713).^[8][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

Harmony, the simultaneous combination of several melodic lines: 1790, in R. Robinson's History of Baptism,^[2] the date Merriam-Webster Unabridged also gives.^[5]

Semantic evolution

Etymonline and Barnhart start the word in 1828 with the sense "multiplicity of sounds", recorded in Noah Webster's American Dictionary,^[3][4][2] and date the musical sense of counterpoint to 1864, suggesting that it was influenced by, or back-formed from, the adjective polyphonic (1782).^[3][4] The OED, revised in 2006, has the musical sense from 1790 instead.^[2] The sense of many sounds or voices also covered mimicry and ventriloquism.^[2] In 1863 the word was applied in phonetics to one letter or character standing for several different sounds,^[2] the sense Collins describes as the use of polyphones in a writing system.^[9] In literary criticism from 1954 it named a text's many independent narrative voices, none given predominance,^[2] and since 1985 it has also named the ability of a synthesizer or mobile phone to sound several notes at once.^[2]

Timeline

• 1790 – in music, harmony; the combination of several individual melodic lines.^[2][5] Etymonline and Barnhart date this sense to 1864.^[3][4]
• 1828 – multiplicity of sounds or voices; also mimicry or ventriloquism.^[2][3][4]
• 1863 – in phonetics, the use of one letter or character for different sounds.^[2]
• 1954 – in literary criticism, a multiplicity of independent narrative voices.^[2]
• 1985 – the ability of a synthesizer or phone to play several notes at once.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. A style of musical composition in which two or more independent melodic lines sound at the same time; counterpoint, especially the unaccompanied vocal music of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.^{[5][10][9][2]}
2. A piece of music written in this style.^[9]
3. A multiplicity of sounds, as in the reverberations of an echo.^[5][2]
4. In a writing system, the representation of more than one sound by the same sign.^[5][9][2]
5. In literary criticism, the presence of many independent voices in a text, none of them dominant.^[2]
6. The ability of a synthesizer or similar device to produce more than one note at once.^[2]

Word family

• polyphonous
• polyphonously

Related words

• cacophony
• heterophony
• polyphonic
• symphony
• phone

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
5. ^ a b c d e f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
7. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ Barnhart, Robert K., ed. (1995), The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology, New York: HarperCollins
9. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
10. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin