Hygiene

How to spell hygiene

7 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce hygiene

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does hygiene mean?

1. nounThe conditions or practices, especially cleanliness, that help to keep people healthy and prevent disease.

Hygiene in a sentence

• The restaurant failed its inspection because of poor kitchen hygiene.

• Good dental hygiene means brushing twice a day and flossing regularly.

Where does hygiene come from?

Language of origin: Greek

This word traces back to the Greek hygieine techne, which meant 'the art of health', built on the adjective hygies, meaning 'healthy' or 'sound'. The Greeks personified the idea in Hygieia, the goddess of health and cleanliness, whose name still echoes in the word today. English borrowed it in the early 1600s by way of French hygiene, where the accented form preserved the awkward run of vowels that catches modern writers out. The sense gradually narrowed from a general science of preserving health to the everyday practices of cleanliness we mean now. The tricky spelling, with the unexpected 'y' standing in for a Greek upsilon and the 'gie' sequence, is a direct fossil of that Greek and French journey, which is exactly why it trips people up.

How the word is built

• hygi- (from Greek hygies: healthy, sound)
• -ene (from the noun ending of Greek hygieine)