mythical

The word 'mythical' is built upon the Greek noun mythos, which originally meant "speech, thought, or tale." In ancient Greek, it came to denote the traditional stories of gods and heroes that explained the world. The adjectival suffix -ic (from Greek -ikos via Latin) was attached to form 'mythic,' meaning "of or relating to myth." The additional Latinate suffix -al was later appended, a common pattern in English to form fuller adjectives. Thus, 'mythical' literally means "pertaining to myth," evolving from describing figures from ancient stories to broadly characterizing anything imagined or fictitious.

Structure: myth (story, legend) + ic (adjective suffix) + al (adjective suffix) - myth: From Greek mythos (speech, thought, story, myth). The core semantic element. - ic: A suffix of Greek origin via Latin -icus, forming adjectives meaning "of, pertaining to, or in the manner of". - al: A suffix from Latin -alis, forming adjectives, often added to words ending in -ic for a fuller adjectival form.