Etymologically
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utopia

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Pronunciation

  • IPA: /juːˈtəʊpiə/ (UK); /juˈtoʊpiə/ (US)[1]

Etymology

It is borrowed from New Latin Ūtopia, the name of an imaginary island in Sir Thomas More's Utopia (1516),[2][3][4][5] which More coined from Ancient Greek οὐ (ou, “not”) + τόπος (tópos, “place”).[2][3][6][4] Its literal meaning is therefore “nowhere”.[4][6]

Earliest recorded meaning

The imaginary island described by More, enjoying a perfect social, legal and political system (in English from 1551).[7][6][4]

Semantic evolution

More's book was written in Latin and first translated into English in 1551.[4][6] The name was extended to any imaginary, remote country by 1610[7] and to any ideally perfect place or state by 1613.[7][6] By the early 18th century it also meant an impossibly ideal scheme for social improvement.[7][2] Although the name means “no place”, it is often taken to mean “good place”, as if from Greek eu- “good”, an idea reinforced by later coinages such as dystopia.[6]

Timeline

  • 1551 – More's imaginary island.[7][6][4]
  • 1597 – first date given by Merriam-Webster.[3]
  • 1610 – any imaginary remote country.[7][4]
  • 1613 – an ideally perfect place or state.[7][6]
  • before 1734 – an impossibly ideal scheme of reform.[7]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. An ideally perfect place or state, especially in its laws, government and society.
  2. An impractical, idealistic scheme for social or political reform.
  3. A work of fiction describing an ideal society.

Word family

  • dystopia
  • utopian
  • topic

References

  1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
  3. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (2003), 11th ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  4. ^ a b c d e f g Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  5. ^ Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary (1999), 2nd ed., New York: Random House
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h Barnhart, Robert K., ed. (1995), The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology, New York: HarperCollins
  7. ^ a b c d e f g h Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press