cosmos

\ \ [17] Cosmos is a learned borrowing from Greek kósmos. The underlying meaning of this was ‘order’, and it appears originally to have been applied to the world and the universe by Pythagoras and his school in reference to the orderliness of creation. In the mid 20th century the word provided a useful linguistic distinction between Western and Soviet activities in space, cosmonaut (from Russian kosmonavt) contrasting with astronaut. Somebody who is cosmopolitan [19] is literally a ‘citizen of the world’, from Greek kosmopolítēs, a compound of kósmos and polítēs.

\ \ From Greek kósmos ‘order’ was derived the verb kosmein ‘arrange, adorn’. This in turn provided the basis of the adjective kosmētikós ‘skilled in adornment’, which passed into English as cosmetic [17].

\ \ Cf.⇒ COSMETIC, COSMOPOLITAN