The word symbol comes from the Greek symbolon. Before it meant anything abstract, a symbolon was a physical object.
The practice was this: when two people entered into an agreement, a bond, a relationship that needed to be provable at a later date, they would take an object and break it in two. Each person kept one half. When the time came to prove the relationship, one party would produce their half, the other would produce theirs, and the two halves would be fitted together. The join was the proof. The match of the broken edges, which could not be forged, was the evidence that these two people had once stood together and made a commitment.
The symbolon was therefore not a symbol in the modern sense, not a representation of something else. It was the thing itself. It was the relationship made material.
What the Word Means
The Greek verb symballein means to throw together, to combine, to bring into contact. The prefix sym means together, with. The root ballein means to throw. A symbolon is something thrown together, something brought into connection with something else. The word implies two things that are separate but belong to each other.
This etymology is present in every use of the word symbol and its derivatives: symbol, symbolic, symbolism. When we say that something is symbolic, we are saying, without usually knowing it, that it is half of something. That it belongs with something else. That it points toward a connection that is real even if the object itself is not the whole thing.
The symbol is always, at its root, one half of a join. For a deeper reading of how symbols work and what makes them carry meaning, see our article on What Is a Symbol.
The Broken Object in History
The practice of breaking objects to create binding agreements appears across many cultures. In ancient Rome, tally sticks were split pieces of wood used to record debts; the creditor and debtor each held half, and the match confirmed the transaction. In medieval England, the Exchequer used tally sticks as official financial records until 1826. In Japan, the broken arrow carried between negotiating parties served a similar function: each side held a piece, the pieces together confirmed the agreement.
The broken ring appears in European folklore as the token exchanged between lovers parted by circumstance. Each carries half. The reunion is confirmed when the halves fit together. This is the symbolon in its most emotionally direct form: the object that proves, across any distance and any amount of time, that these two people belong to each other.
Plato used the symbolon metaphor in the Symposium, in the speech he gives to Aristophanes. In that account, human beings were originally whole creatures, doubled and complete, until Zeus cut them in half. Love is the search for the other half. The symbolon is what proves you have found it.
The Symbolon and the Name SYMBOLIKO
The name SYMBOLIKO comes from the Greek symbolikos, meaning of or belonging to a symbolon. It is not a word that means decorative. It is not a word that means ornamental. It is a word that describes the quality of being a half that belongs with another half, of being the material proof of a connection that existed before the object was made and will exist after it is gone.
Every piece in this collection is made in this understanding. The necklace that carries the Ouroboros is not decorating the person who wears it. It is marking them. It is the half of a symbolon whose other half is the meaning of the Ouroboros itself: the cycle that does not break, the end that is also a beginning, the commitment to return.
The Companion Bond collection makes this literal. The necklace worn by the person and the dog tag worn by their companion are the two halves of the same symbolon. The same symbol, one at each end of the bond. When you see both together, you see the join. You see the proof.
FAQ
What is a symbolon?
A symbolon was a physical object in ancient Greek practice: an object broken in two, with each half kept by one party to an agreement or relationship. When the two halves were brought together and the join confirmed, this served as proof of the relationship. The word is the origin of the English word symbol.
Where does the word symbol come from?
The word symbol comes from the Greek symbolon, derived from the verb symballein, meaning to throw together or to bring into contact. The symbolon was originally a physical broken object used to prove relationships. Over time the word generalized to describe anything that stands in for or points toward something else, but its root meaning of two things that belong together remains present in the etymology.
What does SYMBOLIKO mean?
SYMBOLIKO comes from the Greek symbolikos, meaning of or belonging to a symbolon. It names the quality of being the material proof of a connection: not merely decorative but marking, not merely beautiful but meaningful in the specific sense of pointing toward a relationship that the object itself makes real.
What is the difference between a symbol and a symbolon?
A symbolon in its original sense was a physical object that was itself the proof of a relationship, not a representation of it. The modern word symbol has generalized to describe any representation of something else. But the root meaning persists: a symbol is always, etymologically, half of something. It belongs with something else. It is one side of a join whose other side exists somewhere, in the meaning it points toward or in the person who holds the matching half.