Word.ws English Dictionary

Salonika

Salonika is the alternative spelling of Salonica.

Meaning of Salonica

Proper noun

Salonica

  1. (historical) Synonym of Thessaloniki: a port city, the capital of Central Macedonia, in northern Greece.
    • Sleeping-car passengers, however, will know little of their entry into Greece until, at 6 a.m. on the third morning after leaving Paris, the short train runs over the Vardar plain, with dawn glimpses of Mount Athos to the east and of cloud-capped Olympus across the gulf to the south, past the...1951 November, 'Pausanias', “To Greece by the "Simplon-Orient Express"”, in Railway Magazine, page 731
    Synonyms:
    Thessaloniki

Origin of Salonika

From incomplete latinization of Byzantine Greek Σαλονίκη (Saloníkē), clipping of Ancient Greek Θεσσαλονίκη (Thessaloníkē), named for Thessalonike daughter of Philip II, half-sister of Alexander the Great, and wife of Cassander of Macedonia, from Θεσσᾰλός (Thessălós, “Thessalian”) + νῑ́κη (nī́kē, “victory”), possibly named for her birth on the anniversary of the Battle of Crocus Field. Used chiefly as a calque of Ottoman Turkish سلانیك (Selânik) but with occasional reference to modern Greek Σαλονίκη (Saloníki).

Questions about Salonika

What is Salonika the alternative spelling of?
Salonika is the alternative spelling of Salonica.

Words near Salonika in the dictionary

  1. Salong
  2. Salonga
  3. Salongas
  4. Salonica
  5. salonical
  6. Salonika
  7. salonist
  8. saloniste
  9. salonistes
  10. salonists
  11. salonlike

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: Salonika (page history and authors); Salonica (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “Salonika.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/salonika. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.