Why is the study of weather called meteorology?

Meteorology is the study of weather and Earth’s atmosphere but, it doesn’t study meteors. Or does it?

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — This is a question, most meteorologists have been asked at least once in their career: “Why is the study of weather and the Earth’s atmosphere called meteorology?”

Where does the meteor-part stem from? 

History of meteorology

The term meteorology has quite the history deriving from the Greek word meteoron, which means any phenomenon that is high in the sky. The suffix “-logy” means “the study of.”

Around 340 BC, the famous philosopher Aristotle wrote a treatise called Meteorologica. This is the first record of the study of what’s in the sky and was accepted as an accurate weather theory for nearly 2000 years. By the 17th century, scientific meteorology was born. When a man known as the father of meteorology, Evangelista Torricelli, invented the barometer. 

Aristotle’s Meteorologica talked about small bodies of matter that actively burned in our atmosphere. These were most likely shooting stars or meteors, an area of study now separated into astronomy.

The early writings also have notes of geology and oceanography that were melded into the work.

The meaning of meteorology

Meteorology technically does study meteors. 

The former definition according to Merriam-Webster Dictionary is:

  1. a science that deals with the atmosphere and its phenomena and especially with weather and weather forecasting
  2. the atmospheric phenomena and weather of a region 

So snow, rain, clouds, fog, are all classified as hydrometeors because they are made from water.

  • Lightning is called an electrometeor
  • Dust and smoke in the atmosphere is a lithometeor
  • A rainbow is a photometeor

So even though meteorologists don’t study the one meteor we most commonly know streaking across our skies, the name “meteorology” theoretically fits.

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