Nome
/noʊm/noun
A territorial division of ancient Egypt, governed as an administrative district.
Did you know?The word is Greek, but Egyptians themselves called these districts sepat; Greek writers later labeled them nomes, connecting administration with the wider Greek idea of order and custom.
Etymological Timeline
Proto-Indo-European
PIE
*nem-
“To assign, distribute, or divide into shares.”
Ancient Greek
Greek
νόμος (nomos)
“A custom, law, rule, or an allotted district; the sense developed from the idea of an assigned portion.”
5th Century BCE
Greek
νομός (nomos)
“A province or administrative district of Egypt, as used by Greek historians such as Herodotus.”
Late Antiquity
Greek/Latin
nomus
“A territorial division or Egyptian province in scholarly and administrative writing.”
17th–19th Century
French/English
nome
“A learned term for an ancient Egyptian administrative district.”
Modern English
English
nome
“A division of ancient Egypt, commonly described as one of its provinces.”