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a.

Comes from the Greek god Pan.

b.

Pan was a god of nature who lived in the woods.

c.

According to myths, Pan’s voice was so powerful that it even scared the gods themselves.

d.

Pan had goats’ legs and horns on his head which influenced how the Devil is depicted in Western literature.

Hi everyone, and welcome to our fun segment called It Means What? Hello, 安澜.

Hi, Lulu, hi, everyone.

欢迎回来这个非常有意思的小版块词《源考古研究所》where we talk about interesting origin stories of words, phrases and idioms. So 安澜, what is the word or the phrase for today?

I don't know what are we gonna do.  I ...I don't know, I really just don't know.

Stop panicking.

There we go.  

So that was all an act because you do that so often...?

Partly, yes.

所以我们今天要讨论的就是panic这个词是吗?

Yes.

Panic是恐慌的意思. It's already a very, very short word. It's p-a-n-i-c, I didn't realize there is an origin story.

Yes, there is. It comes from Greek mythology.

希腊神话。Who are we talking about?

We're talking about the Greek God Pan.

Is he the one with like this weird...half animal.

Yes.

潘神可能有的小伙伴在什么游戏或者说电影里面看到过这个Greek God Pan. He's not like a major god, he's like a minor God.

He's a god of nature who lives in the woods.

So he's not a particularly important god. He's one of these spirits or gods that just live in forests and woods.

It's kind of like a demigod

他不是major god, 不是那种主神, 就是古希腊神话里面的主神, 但它是属于有点类似于spirit, and a god of nature and the wild.

Yes, so according to the myths, Pan's voice was so powerful that even scared the gods themselves.

So when people and gods and animals heard his voice, it cause them to panic.

Yeah, I've heard of another story saying that it was like a tale of war when Pan sort of helped his friend by letting out a shriek... a shrieking sound that sort of scared away his friend’s enemies. Yeah, so cause people to panic.

其实panic就是从潘神这里出来的一个名词, 就是说it's kind of like affected by Pan.

So for example, you can say something causes panic or someone is panicking.

Yeah, in that sense it can also be used as a verb, for example, 安澜 likes to panic.

Yes,  that is true.

But by the way, is Pan, so we're talking about this Greek minor god Pan, he wasn't like evil or anything, but he also wasn't like particularly good. He was kind of like walking between the good and the evil.

Yes. In Greek mythology, the gods they weren't seen as either particularly good or particularly bad. They were seen almost like humans, so they had their weaknesses, they had their strengths. Sometimes they got angry, sometimes they got vengeful. They just acted basically almost a little bit like children.

And also Pan was quite mischievous as well

Absolutely

since he was representing nature,  the wild the woods.

Yes.

I think along with Pan, other things like nymphs, they're all like spirits in the wild.

That's the thing about Greek myths. Like the woods in Greece must have been filled with creatures,  gods, spirits, they were all over the place.

But one interesting thing about Pan was how he looked, because he had goat’s legs, he has horns right? and horns on his head.  And that is where our idea of the devil comes from.

The horned one, why is that? So if Pan wasn't evil intrinsically, how has that influenced how the devil is depicted in western literature or methodology belief.

Some people say it was when Christianity first became mainstream in Europe. There were still lots of people that worshipped the gods of nature.

or so you were seen as like pagan belief.

是因为有后面的基督教出来的时候, 那些原始的就是他们认为更原始的宗教就变成了异教.

So basically they were saying that ok, this god you're worshipping, it's not good. He's the devil.

I think it's also because the nature of Pan because Pan is the god of nature, the wild. So he was pretty like mischievous and unpredictable. He wasn't as formulaic or regulated as the Christian belief of gods.

And you have to think as well, back then, the woods forests were much bigger than they are nowadays.  These were really scary places for people.

I mean, that can be seen in folk lores all of the world.

By the way, I think there was a movie a couple of decades... Pan’s Labyrinth, 《潘神的迷宫》 and that was the same Pan.

So next time when you think about the word panic,  that is from the Greek God Pan, the god of nature.

So the question is, 安澜, are you really prone to panic?

In some cases, yes. I have been known to panic on occasion, but I try to keep myself calm.

What calms you down when you feel like you're starting to panic?

I just normally take a deep breath or if I can maybe have a whiskey, but just generally take... trying to take a deep breath and remind myself that there's no need to panic.

And also now we talk about panic attack. I think I used to have a colleague who had a panic attack right in front of my eyes right in front of me,  you could really see how he was panicking.

Now I personally also went through panic attacks.

Same here.

On that note, we're going to wrap up today's etymology segment. 在我们结束今天的【词源考古研究所】之前, 也要告诉大家, 我们有一个新的习语课程上线our new idiom course, which is created by 安澜and me. Yep.

If you like idioms you will definitely love this course.

where we tell you the origin stories and the usage of 300 different idioms. If you're interested check it out, 大家可以到微信视频号【璐璐的英文小酒馆】小店里面去看看, 就有这个课程了.

You can also check out our live stream.

And on that note, we're gonna wrap up here. Leave us a comment in the comment section and tell us about your panic stories.

If you want to

or you can write down the request for a specific word, phrase or idiom.  Thank you, 安澜for coming to the show.

Thanks, Lulu. Thanks, everyone.

We'll see you next time.

Bye bye.