今日读数学史，看到公元2世纪托勒密就写下了Syntaxis一书，是天文学方面的重要著作，也被认为是三角学最早的系统性论述。

查了下词源，原来在古希腊语里面指的是安排的意思。比grammar好点。

http://www.etymonline.com/

c. 1600, from French syntaxe (16c.) and directly from Late Latin syntaxis, from Greek syntaxis "a putting together or in order, arrangement, a grammatical construction," from stem of syntassein "put in order," from syn- "together" (see syn-) + tassein "arrange" (see tactics).