Editing Ploidy (section)

==Etymology==
The term ''ploidy'' is a [[back-formation]] from ''haploidy'' and ''diploidy''. "Ploid" is a combination of Ancient Greek -πλόος (-plóos, "-fold") and -ειδής (-''eidḗs''), from εἶδος (''eîdos'', "form, likeness").{{efn|Compare the etymology of [[tuple]], from the Latin for "-fold".}} The principal meaning of the [[Greek language|Greek]] word ᾰ̔πλόος (haplóos) is "single",<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/morph?l=(aploos&la=greek#lexicon|title=Greek Word Study Tool|website=www.perseus.tufts.edu}}</ref> from ἁ- (ha-, "one, same").<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/morph?l=a(/ma&la=greek&can=a(/ma0&prior=a(plo/os|title=Greek Word Study Tool|website=www.perseus.tufts.edu}}</ref> διπλόος (''diplóos'') means "duplex" or "two-fold". Diploid therefore means "duplex-shaped" (compare "humanoid", "human-shaped").

Polish-German botanist [[Eduard Strasburger]] coined the terms ''haploid'' and ''diploid'' in 1905.{{efn|The original text in German is as follows: "Schließlich wäre es vielleicht erwünscht, wenn den Bezeichnungen Gametophyt und Sporophyt, die sich allein nur auf Pflanzen mit einfacher und mit doppelter Chromosomenzahl anwenden lassen, solche zur Seite gestellt würden, welche auch für das Tierreich passen. Ich erlaube mir zu diesem Zwecke die Worte Haploid und Diploid, bezw. haploidische und diploidische Generation vorzuschlagen."<ref>{{cite journal | last1=Strasburger | first1=Eduard | last2=Allen | first2=Charles E. | last3=Miyake | first3=Kilchi | last4=Overten | first4=James B. | date=1905 | title=Histologische Beiträge zur Vererbungsfrage | journal=Jahrbücher für Wissenschaftliche Botanik | volume=42 | pages=62 | url=https://archive.org/stream/jahrbcherfrwiss32stragoog | access-date=2017-03-11}}</ref><ref>{{cite book | last=Toepfer | first=Georg | date=2011 | title=Historisches Worterbüch der Biologie - Geschichte und Theorie der biologischen Grundbegriffe | location=Stuttgart | publisher=J.B. Metzler'sche Verlagsbuchhandlung und Carl Ernst Poeschel Verlag GmbH | page=169 | isbn=978-3-476-02317-9}}</ref>}} Some authors suggest that Strasburger based the terms on [[August Weismann]]'s conception of the id (or [[germ plasm]]),<ref>{{cite journal | author=Battaglia E | year=2009 | title=Caryoneme alternative to chromosome and a new caryological nomenclature | url=http://www.caryologia.unifi.it/past_volumes/62_4supplement/62-4_supplement.pdf | journal=Caryologia | volume=62 | issue=4 | pages=48}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal | author=David Haig | year=2008 | title=Homologous versus antithetic alternation of generations and the origin of sporophytes | url=http://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle/1/11148775/Haig_HomologousVersus.pdf?sequence=3 | journal=The Botanical Review | volume=74 | issue=3 | pages=395–418 | doi=10.1007/s12229-008-9012-x| bibcode=2008BotRv..74..395H | s2cid=207403936 | author-link=David Haig (biologist) }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal | last=Bennett | first=Michael D. | date=2004 | title=Biological relevance of polyploidy: ecology to genomics | journal=Biological Journal of the Linnean Society | volume=82 | issue=4 | pages=411–423 | doi=10.1111/j.1095-8312.2004.00328.x| doi-access=free }}</ref> hence haplo-''id'' and diplo-''id''. The two terms were brought into the English language from German through [[William Henry Lang]]'s 1908 translation of a 1906 textbook by Strasburger and colleagues.<ref>Strasburger, E.; Noll, F.; Schenck, H.; Karsten, G. 1908. ''A Textbook of botany'', 3rd English ed. (1908) [https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/bibliography/1250#/summary], rev. with the 8th German ed. (1906) [http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:hbz:061:2-31697], translation by W. H. Lang of ''Lehrbuch der Botanik für Hochschulen''. Macmillan, London.</ref>{{Citation needed |date=January 2014}}