zoon politikon, n.

zoon-politikon
http://www.oed.com/dictionary/zoon-politikon_n%3Ftab%3Dmeaning_and_use
Revised 2017

# zoon politikonnoun

## Earlier version

- zoon politikon in OED Second Edition (1989)

## Factsheet

### What does the noun zoon politikon mean?

There is one meaning in OED's entry for the noun zoon politikon. See ‘Meaning & use’ for definition, usage, and quotation evidence.

### How common is the noun zoon politikon?

About 0.01occurrences per million words in modern written English

1890 | 0.001
1900 | 0.0013
1910 | 0.0016
1920 | 0.0019
1930 | 0.0029
1940 | 0.0041
1950 | 0.0052
1960 | 0.0067
1970 | 0.0081
1980 | 0.0094
1990 | 0.01
2000 | 0.011
2010 | 0.011

### How is the noun zoon politikon pronounced?

#### British English

/ˌzəʊɒn pəˈlɪtᵻkɒn/
zoh-on puh-LIT-uh-kon
/ˌzəʊən pəˈlɪtᵻkɒn/
zoh-uhn puh-LIT-uh-kon

#### U.S. English

/ˌzoʊˌɑn pəˈlɪdᵻˌkɑn/
zoh-ahn puh-LID-uh-kahn
/ˌzoʊən pəˈlɪdᵻkən/
zoh-uhn puh-LID-uh-kuhn

### Where does the noun zoon politikon come from?

Earliest known use

1890s

The earliest known use of the noun zoon politikon is in the 1890s.

OED's earliest evidence for zoon politikon is from 1895, in British Medical Journal.

zoon politikon is a borrowing from Greek.

Etymons: Greek πολιτικὸν ζῷον.

### Nearby entries

1. zoonite, n. 1838–
2. zoonitic, adj. 1860–91
3. zoonomic, adj. 1836–
4. zoonomical, adj. 1800–
5. zoonomist, n. 1800–99
6. zoonomy, n. 1800–
7. zoonosis, n. 1873–
8. zoonosologist, n. 1860–
9. zoonosology, n. 1845–
10. zoonotic, adj. 1877–
11. zoon politikon, n.1895–
12. zoonters, int. a1763–
13. zoo-organic, adj. 1821–90
14. zoopathologist, n. 1898–
15. zoopathology, n. 1841–
16. zoophagan, n. & adj. 1835–
17. zoophagic, adj. 1903–
18. zoophagous, adj. 1788–
19. zoophagy, n. 1849–
20. zoophile, n. 1885–
21. zoophilia, n. 1894–

## Etymology

### Summary

A borrowing from Greek.
Etymon: Greek πολιτικὸν ζῷον.
< ancient Greek πολιτικὸν ζῷον (Aristotle Politics 1253a3; < πολιτικόν, neuter of πολιτικός politic adj. + ζῷον animal: see zoon n.), with transposition of the elements…
< ancient Greek πολιτικὸν ζῷον (Aristotle Politics 1253a3; < πολιτικόν, neuter of πολιτικός politic adj. + ζῷον animal: see zoon n.), with transposition of the elements.

### Notes

In plural form zoa politika after Greek first-declension neuter noun plurals in ‑α.

## Meaning & use

1. 1895–
   = political animal n.
   1. [1691

      > I have made thee a sociable Creature, ζωον πολιτικὸν, for the improvement of thy Understanding by Conference.

      J. Ray, Wisdom of God 115]
   2. 1895

      > He considers that the ‘zoon politicon’, the methodical being, the animal of culture, is exclusively the male.

      British Medical Journal 19 October 986/1
   3. 1902

      > Attempts were made to enlighten the political conscience of the voters, to act on the zoon politikon.

      F. Clarke, translation of M. Y. Ostrogorski, Democracy & Organization Polit. Parties vol. I. iii. iii. 420
   4. 1958

      > Anybody who regards man as necessarily..a zoon politikon.

      W. Stark, Sociology of Knowledge 238
   5. 1993

      > Natural men would lead a life in which there was no true society—men were by no means zoa politika.

      R. Tuck, Philos. & Government 1572–1651 174
   6. 2013

      > Christoph was a genuine zöon politikon, loving to read newspapers and to discuss politics.

      Rev. Middle East Studies vol. 47 280
   politics
   1. civilian 1570
      A person who is concerned with political matters; a politician. Obsolete. rare.
   2. politician 1629–
      A person who is keenly interested in practical politics, or who engages in party politics or political strife; now spec. one who is…
   3. politic animal 1699–1835
      politic animal = political animal, n. Obsolete.
   4. political animal 1710–
      a. A person viewed as tending to live and act with others, esp. in an organized community; b. a person who is interested in or concerned about…
   5. politico 1893–
      Now chiefly colloquial and somewhat derogatory. A politician. Now also: a person holding strong political views or acting with political motivation.
   6. zoon politikon 1895–
      = political animal, n.
   View in Historical Thesaurus

## Pronunciation

### British English

/ˌzəʊɒn pəˈlɪtᵻkɒn/
zoh-on puh-LIT-uh-kon
/ˌzəʊən pəˈlɪtᵻkɒn/
zoh-uhn puh-LIT-uh-kon

### U.S. English

/ˌzoʊˌɑn pəˈlɪdᵻˌkɑn/
zoh-ahn puh-LID-uh-kahn
/ˌzoʊən pəˈlɪdᵻkən/
zoh-uhn puh-LID-uh-kuhn

###
Plural: zoa politika

### British English

/ˌzəʊə pəˈlɪtᵻkə/
zoh-uh puh-LIT-uh-kuh

### U.S. English

/ˌzoʊə pəˈlɪdᵻkə/
zoh-uh puh-LID-uh-kuh

####

##### Consonants

- ppea
- ttea
- kkey
- bbuy
- ddye
- ɡguy
- tʃchore
- dʒjay
- ffore
- θthaw
- ssore
- ʃshore
- vvee
- ðthee
- zzee
- ʒbeige
- xloch
- hhay
- llay
- ɬrhingyll
- rray
- wway
- jyore
- mmay
- nnay
- ŋsing

Some consonants can take the function of the vowel in unstressed syllables. Where necessary, a syllabic marker diacritic is used, hence /ˈpɛtl/ but /ˈpɛtl̩i/.

##### Vowels

- iːfleece
- ihappy
- ɪkit
- ɛdress
- atrap, bath
- ɑːstart, palm, bath
- ɒlot
- ɔːthought, force
- ʌstrut
- ʊfoot
- uːgoose
- əletter
- əːnurse
- ɪənear
- ɛːsquare
- ʊəcure
- eɪface
- ʌɪpride
- aʊmouth
- əʊgoat
- ɔɪvoice
- ãgratin
- ɒ̃salon
- ᵻ(/ɪ/-/ə/)
- ᵿ(/ʊ/-/ə/)

##### Other symbols

- The symbol ˈ at the beginning of a syllable indicates that that syllable is pronounced with primary stress.
- The symbol ˌ at the beginning of a syllable indicates that that syllable is pronounced with secondary stress.
- Round brackets ( ) in a transcription indicate that the symbol within the brackets is optional.

View the pronunciation model here.

####

##### Consonants

- ppea
- ttea
- kkey
- bbuy
- ddye*
- ɡguy
- tʃchore
- dʒjay
- ffore
- θthaw
- ssore
- ʃshore
- vvee
- ðthee
- zzee
- ʒbeige
- xloch
- hhay
- llay
- rray
- wway
- jyore
- mmay
- nnay
- ŋsing

* /d/ also represents a 'tapped' /t/ as in

Some consonants can take the function of the vowel in unstressed syllables. Where necessary, a syllabic marker diacritic is used, hence /ˈpɛd(ə)l/ but /ˈpɛdl̩i/.

##### Vowels

- ifleece, happy
- ɪkit
- ɛdress
- ætrap, bath
- ɑlot, palm, cloth, thought
- ɑrstart
- ɔcloth, thought
- ɔrnorth, force
- ʊfoot
- ugoose
- əstrut, comma
- ərnurse, letter
- ɪ(ə)rnear
- ɛ(ə)rsquare
- ʊ(ə)rcure
- eɪface
- aɪpride
- aʊmouth
- oʊgoat
- ɔɪvoice
- ɑ̃gratin
- æ̃salon
- ᵻ(/ɪ/-/ə/)
- ᵿ(/ʊ/-/ə/)

##### Other symbols

- The symbol ˈ at the beginning of a syllable indicates that that syllable is pronounced with primary stress.
- The symbol ˌ at the beginning of a syllable indicates that that syllable is pronounced with secondary stress.
- Round brackets ( ) in a transcription indicate that the symbol within the brackets is optional.

View the pronunciation model here.

####

Simple text respell breaks words into syllables, separated by a hyphen. The syllable which carries the primary stress is written in capital letters. This key covers both British and U.S. English Simple Text Respell.

##### Consonants

b, d, f, h, k, l, m, n, p, r, s, t, v, w and z have their standard English values

- gguy
- jjay
- yyore
- chchore
- khloch
- shshore
- ththaw
- dhthee
- zhbeige

##### Vowels

- atrap
- ahpalm
- airsquare
- arstart
- arrcarry (British only)
- awthought
- ayface
- a(ng)gratin
- edress
- eefleece
- eerdeer
- errmerry
- ikit
- ighpride
- irrmirror
- olot (British only)
- ohgoat
- oogoose
- oorcure
- orforce
- orrsorry (British only)
- owmouth
- oyvoice
- o(ng)salon
- ustrut
- uhletter
- urnurse
- urrhurry
- uufoot

## Forms

### Inflections

Plural: zoa politika ( British English /ˌzəʊə pəˈlɪtᵻkə/ (zoh-uh puh-LIT-uh-kuh) , U.S. English /ˌzoʊə pəˈlɪdᵻkə/ (zoh-uh puh-LID-uh-kuh) )

### Variant forms

1. 1800s–
   zoon politicon, zoon politikon, zöon politikon
2. 1900s–
   zoön politikon

## Frequency

zoon politikon typically occurs about 0.01 times per million words in modern written English.

zoon politikon is in frequency band 3, which contains words occurring between 0.01 and 0.1 times per million words in modern written English. More about OED's frequency bands

Frequency data is computed programmatically, and should be regarded as an estimate.

### Frequency of zoon politikon, n., 1890–2010

* Occurrences per million words in written English

Historical frequency series are derived from Google Books Ngrams (version 2), a data set based on the Google Books corpus of several million books printed in English between 1500 and 2010.

The overall frequency for a given word is calculated by summing frequencies for the main form of the word, any plural or inflected forms, and any major spelling variations.

For sets of homographs (distinct entries that share the same word-form, e.g. mole, n.¹, mole, n.², mole, n.³, etc.), we have estimated the frequency of each homograph entry as a fraction of the total Ngrams frequency for the word-form. This may result in inaccuracies.

Smoothing has been applied to series for lower-frequency words, using a moving-average algorithm. This reduces short-term fluctuations, which may be produced by variability in the content of the Google Books corpus.

Decade | Frequency per million words
--- | ---
1890 | 0.001
1900 | 0.0013
1910 | 0.0016
1920 | 0.0019
1930 | 0.0029
1940 | 0.0041
1950 | 0.0052
1960 | 0.0067
1970 | 0.0081
1980 | 0.0094
1990 | 0.01
2000 | 0.011
2010 | 0.011

zoon politikon, n. was revised in June 2017.

zoon politikon, n. was last modified in July 2023.