Editing Polymath (section)

== Etymology ==
The word polymath derives from the [[Ancient Greek|Greek]] roots ''poly-'', which means "much" or "many," and ''manthanein'', which means "to learn."<ref>{{Cite web |title=Etymology of "polymath" by etymonline |url=https://www.etymonline.com/word/polymath |access-date=2025-04-16 |website=etymonline |language=en-US}}</ref> [[Plutarch]] wrote that the Ancient Greek [[Muses|muse]] [[Polyhymnia]] was sometimes known as [[Polymatheia]], describing her as responsible for "that faculty of the soul which inclines to attain and keep knowledge."<ref>{{Cite web |last=Plutarch |first= |title=Plutarch, Quaestiones Convivales, Book 9., chapter 14, section 7 |url=https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text;jsessionid=09AED5A32CD64E4DC379AB3696B984AE?doc=Plut.+Quaes.+Conv.+9.14.7&fromdoc=Perseus:text:2008.01.0312 |access-date=2025-04-16 |website=www.perseus.tufts.edu}}</ref>

In Western Europe, the first work to use the term '''polymathy''' in its title, {{lang|la|De Polymathia tractatio: integri operis de studiis veterum}} (A Treatise on Polymathy: The Complete Work on the Studies of the Ancients), was published in 1603 by [[Johann von Wowern]], a Hamburg philosopher.<ref name="auto">{{cite journal |last = Murphy |first = Kathryn |title = Robert Burton and the problems of polymathy |journal = Renaissance Studies |volume = 28 |issue = 2 |page = 279 |year = 2014 |doi = 10.1111/rest.12054 |s2cid = 162763342 |url = https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:10953b9e-24fd-48a0-8cf6-d9d9524e16c1 |access-date = 6 September 2020 |archive-date = 30 April 2021 |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20210430205310/https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:10953b9e-24fd-48a0-8cf6-d9d9524e16c1 |url-status = live }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last = Burke |first = Peter |title = O polímata: a história cultural e social de um tipo intellectual |journal = Leitura: Teoria & Prática |year = 2011 |issn = 0102-387X }}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Wower |first=Johann |title = De Polymathia tractatio: integri operis de studiis veterum |year = 1665 }}</ref> Von Wowern defined polymathy as "knowledge of various matters, drawn from all kinds of studies&nbsp;... ranging freely through all the fields of the disciplines, as far as the [[human]] mind, with unwearied industry, is able to pursue them".<ref name="auto" /> Von Wowern lists erudition, literature, [[philology]], [[philomathy]], and polyhistory as synonyms.

The earliest recorded use of the term in the [[English language]] is from 1624, in the second edition of ''[[The Anatomy of Melancholy]]'' by [[Robert Burton (scholar)|Robert Burton]];{{r|oed}} the form ''polymathist'' is slightly older, first appearing in the ''Diatribae upon the first part of the late History of Tithes'' of [[Richard Montagu]] in 1621.{{r|oed2}} Use in English of the similar term ''polyhistor'' dates from the late 16th century.{{r|oed3}}