The word “Galaxy” comes from the Greek word for “milk”.

Our galaxy, the Milky Way, has actually had that name for a long time. Geoffrey Chaucer first named it “Milky Wey” in the 14th Century. Still, centuries before that, our galaxy was called “kyklos galaktikos” ( “milky circle”) back in Ancient Greece. The stars in space were thought to to be similar in appearance to milk. Other massive groups of stars started being referred to by the generic word “galaxy” based on the name of our own galaxy. As it turns out, the name “Milky Way” (the Greek version, at least) predates the word for “galaxy” and all other galaxies are technically being named after our galaxy, the “Milky Way”.

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