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utopia

yoo-TOH-pee-uh · noun

Ancient GreekNew LatinEnglish

Origin

Coined by Sir Thomas More in his 1516 book Utopia, from Ancient Greek οὐ (ou, "not") plus τόπος (tópos, "place, region") plus the suffix -ία (-ía). The word was built as the name of More's fictional island with a seemingly perfect socio-politico-legal system.

Journey

It began as the invented name of a single imaginary island in More's book, then widened into English as a common noun for any imagined ideal society.

Related words

It shares its second root with English topos, and its ending relates to the English suffix -ia.

More words

From New Latin

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