archetype

[17] Archetype comes, via Latin archetypum, from Greek arkhétupon, a nominal use of the adjective arkhétupos, literally ‘firstmoulded’, from túpos ‘mould, model, type’. The Greek prefix arkhe- was based on the noun arkhos ‘chief, ruler’, a derivative of the verb arkhein ‘begin, rule’ (see ARCHIVES). It first entered our language (via Latin archi-) in the Old English period, as arce- (archbishop was an early compound formed with it); and it was reborrowed in the Middle English period from Old French arche-. Its use has gradually extended from ‘highest in status’ and ‘first of its kind’ to ‘the ultimate – and usually the worst – of its kind’, as in archcraitor. Its negative connotations lie behind its eventual development, in the 17th century, into an independent adjective, first as ‘cunning, crafty’, later as ‘saucy, mischievous’. The same Greek root has provided English with the suffixes -arch and -archy (as in monarch, oligarchy); but here the original meaning of ‘ruling’ has been preserved much more stably. => ARCHAIC, ARCHIVES