www.alphadictionary.com

First, congratulate me that I bought a 700p book for a little over $6! It's on codes and cryptology. The author derives cryptology from the Greek Kryptos, secret, plus ology which is derived either from logos, word, or ology, science. My basic question is whether ology itself is a derivation of logos. Science is not a good translation of ology, IMHO, but rather the study of various subjects, whether by scientific methods or not. The Greeks knew comparitively little about wht we now call science and scientific method.

First, congratulations: 700p is, since decimalisation in 1971, 7 pounds and is almost 11USD at the current exchange rate. You got a bargain!

Second, shouldn't this be posted in the Etymology section instead of Languages of the World?

Third, according to the Etymological Dictionary, -logy refers to "a speaking, discourse, treatise, doctrine, theory, science," from Gk. -logia (often via Fr. -logie or M.L. -logia), from root of legein "to speak;" thus, "the character or department of one who speaks or treats of (a certain subject);" see lecture."

So I would say -logy doesn't so much mean "science" as it does "words/lectures on a subject." In the case of cryptology, it would be words on cryptic, secret matters.

Probably I should have written 700pp, as you must know. Thanks for confirming my thoughts on -logy or -ology.

bnjtokyo: Thank you for letting us know for sure that the suffixes ology and logia are essentialy the same.

"In the beginning was the Word."

Perry: What Greek word is translated Word in the above quotation. Is it λόγος? Also, how do I write capital Greek letters on this post. I paste in Greek capitals and they come out Roman letter equivalents while the "lower case" Greek letters suvive the transfer. I get my Greek letters from the Microsoft type face "Symbols".

My friend and supervisor during my days of technical toil was in the CIA Crypto group that broke the German code. I once had the honor of meeting that entire Crypto group. For myself, I am entirely cryptologically illiterate. I can speak Pig Latin.

Probably you could learn dog Latin as well. Yes, logos is the word you want (pun intended). Which opens into a classic problem whether the reference is to the Greek background or the Hebrew term dabhar, which also means word. If the former, the term is to establish Christ as superior to one of the Greek creator gods. If Hebrew, which I think, it is a comment on Genesis 1:1 and also links with the repeated OT phrase "the word of the Lord came to.....saying" Of course, both could be involved in the thought. Re yr question on transferring Gr capitals, I have no clue.