To the Editor:
We wish to express our thanks to Dr. Denton Cooley for his editorial “In Pursuit of an Eponym,” which appeared in the most recent issue of this journal.1 The Greek word “εεΠώνυμον” (eponymon) derives from 2 words: “εΠί” (epi = upon) and “ώνομα” (onoma = name) and is actually what today we refer to as the family name. This means that every individual is eponymous; no one is anonymous unless his name, that is, his or her name and family name, is not known.
Thus each of us, well known or less known, will remain in the memories of the future generations by name and eponym, which is the family name. Pericles (495–429 BC), in his funeral oration honoring the first Athenians killed in the Peloponnesian War, stat-ed that “famous men have the whole earth as their memorial and they are remembered through monuments and inscriptions not only in their own country but also abroad where their memory remains inscribed in the minds of every one rather than in materially constructed monuments.”2,3
I envy Dr. Cooley for his work, his teaching, and his service to medicine. Due to these achievements, he is “fortunate enough to be recognized … and might thereby, in some small measure, be immortalized.”1 Therefore, he has no need to pursue an eponym; he already has a name and an eponym: DENTON A. COOLEY.
References
- 1.Cooley DA. In pursuit of an eponym. Tex Heart Inst J 2004; 31:117. [PMC free article] [PubMed]
- 2.Thucydides histories, Book B, 43, Venizelos Translation (Greek). Oxford (UK): Oxford University Press; 1946.
- 3.The Oxford dictionary of quotations. Oxford (UK): Oxford University Press; 1986. p. 372/23.