aphelion
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English
[edit]Etymology
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A Greek form of New Latin aphēlium (whence English aphelium, now displaced), from Ancient Greek ἀπο- (apo-, prefix meaning ‘away, from, off’) + ἥλῐος (hḗlios, “the sun”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *sóh₂wl̥ (“the sun”)) + -ον (-on, suffix forming some nouns), modelled after New Latin apogaeum (“apogee”).[1]
The plural form aphelia is from aphelion + -a (plural form of the suffix -on).
Pronunciation
[edit]- (Received Pronunciation) IPA(key): /əˈfiː.lɪ.ən/, /æpˈhiː.lɪ.ən/
Audio (Southern England): (file)
- (General American) IPA(key): /əˈfi.li.ən/, /əˈfil.jən/, /æpˈhi.li.ən/, /æpˈhil.jən/
- Hyphenation: ap‧hel‧i‧on
- Homophone: Ophelian (one pronunciation)
- Rhymes: -iːliən
Noun
[edit]aphelion (plural aphelia or (deprecated) aphelions)
- (astronomy, also figuratively) The point in the elliptical orbit of a comet, planet, or other astronomical object, where it is farthest from the Sun.
- Antonym: perihelion
- 1837, William Whewell, “The Inductive Epoch of Newton—Discovery of the Universal Gravitation of Matter, according to the Law of the Inverse Square of the Distance”, in History of the Inductive Sciences, from the Earliest to the Present Times. […], volume II, London: John W[illiam] Parker, […]; Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: J. and J. J. Deighton, →OCLC, book VII (History of Physical Astronomy), page 170:
- [I]t follows from the theory of gravity, that the aphelia of Mercury, Venus, the Earth, and Mars, slightly progress.
Hypernyms
[edit]Related terms
[edit]Translations
[edit]point in the elliptical orbit of a planet where it is farthest from the Sun
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References
[edit]- ^ “aphelion, n.”, in OED Online , Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, December 2021; “aphelion, n.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
Further reading
[edit]Anagrams
[edit]Categories:
- English terms derived from the Proto-Indo-European word *h₂epó
- English terms derived from the Proto-Indo-European word *sóh₂wl̥
- English terms derived from New Latin
- English terms derived from Ancient Greek
- English terms derived from Proto-Indo-European
- English 4-syllable words
- English terms with IPA pronunciation
- English terms with audio pronunciation
- English 3-syllable words
- English terms with homophones
- Rhymes:English/iːliən
- Rhymes:English/iːliən/4 syllables
- English lemmas
- English nouns
- English countable nouns
- English nouns with irregular plurals
- en:Astronomy
- English terms with quotations