Syllabus

The word is also used more generally for an abstract or programme of knowledge, and is best known in this sense as referring to two catalogues published by the Catholic Church in 1864 and 1907 condemning certain doctrinal positions.

Etymology

According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the word syllabus derives from modern Latin syllabus 'list', in turn from a misreading of the Greek σίττυβος sittybos (the leather parchment label that gave the title and contents of a document), which first occurred in a 15th-century print of Cicero's letters to Atticus. Earlier Latin dictionaries such as Lewis and Short contain the word syllabus, relating it to the non-existent Greek word σύλλαβος, which appears to be a mistaken reading of syllaba 'syllable'; the newer Oxford Latin Dictionary does not contain this word. The apparent change from sitty- to sylla- is explained as a hypercorrection by analogy to συλλαμβάνω (syllambano 'bring together, gather').

Chambers Dictionary agrees that it derives from the Greek for a book label, but claims that the original Greek was a feminine noun, sittybā, σίττυβα, borrowed by Latin, the misreading coming from an accusative plural Latin sittybas.