Well attestedIndirect, via a person or title
-athon
noun · first attested 1930s
Every telethon and hackathon is a misreading of a Greek battlefield.
A suffix forming nouns for a long, sustained event, especially one staged to raise money.
Record
- Relationship
- Indirect, via a person or title
- Confidence
- Well attestedThe place link is the standard scholarly account.
- Attested
- 1930s
- Part of speech
- noun
Explanations here are written for this atlas. Dictionary text is not copied; the sources are linked so the claim can be checked.
- Step 1
Marathon
- In English
-athon
The 1896 Olympic marathon was named for the run from Marathon to Athens with news of the Greek victory over Persia in 490 BC. English speakers then split the word in the wrong place, taking mar-athon as mara plus thon, and the loose ending began attaching to anything long: walkathon in the 1930s, telethon in 1949, hackathon in the 1990s.
Also pinned to Marathon
1 more from the same place
Greece
All 29 entries 27 more words from Greece
currantThe baking fruit is a worn-down word for Corinth.CorinthmagnetThe lodestone is named for Magnesia.MagnesiaacademyEvery academy is named for a grove outside Athens.AkademeialaconicA tight-lipped style is named for Sparta’s region.SpartaOlympicThe games are named for a sanctuary, not for Mount Olympus.OlympiaatticThe room under the roof is named for the region around Athens.AtticaBoeotianAn insult preserved from one Greek region's rivalry with another.BoeotiacosOne lettuce is named for a Greek island and the other for Rome.Kos