epoch
pronunciation
How to pronounce epoch in British English:
UK [ˈiːpɒk]
How to pronounce epoch in American English:
US [ˈepək]
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- Noun:
- a period marked by distinctive character or reckoned from a fixed point or event
- (astronomy) the precise date that is the point of reference for which information (as coordinates of a celestial body) is referred
- a unit of geological time
Word Origin
- epoch
- epoch: [17] Historically, epoch means ‘point in time’, but its particular application to ‘point marking the beginning of a new period of time’ has led increasingly to its use in modern English for simply ‘historical period’. The word comes via modern Latin epocha from Greek epokhé, literally ‘pause, stoppage’, and hence ‘fixed point in time’. This was a derivative of epékhein ‘pause, hold back’, a compound verb formed from the prefix epí- ‘back’ and ékhein ‘hold’ (source of English hectic and related to scheme and sketch).=> hectic, scheme, sketch
- epoch (n.)
- 1610s, epocha, "point marking the start of a new period in time" (such as the founding of Rome, the birth of Christ, the Hegira), from Medieval Latin epocha, from Greek epokhe "stoppage, fixed point of time," from epekhein "to pause, take up a position," from epi "on" (see epi-) + ekhein "to hold" (see scheme (n.)). Transferred sense of "a period of time" is 1620s; geological usage (not a precise measurement) is from 1802.
Example
- 1. In couch-surfing time , two months was an epoch .
- 2. That moment came to be known as the epoch .
- 3. Each evolutionary and historical epoch has been associated with a specific stage of individual cognitive development together with correlative socially shared worldviews and moralities .
- 4. The preceding palaeocene epoch was also brought to an end , the rocks suggest , by a sudden release of methane .
- 5. This epoch has probably now ended .