antipodes [LME] Think of a person standing on the other side of the world, exactly opposite the point on the Earth’s surface where you are standing. The soles of their feet are facing the soles of your feet. This is the idea behind the word antipodes, which came via French or Latin from the Greek word antipous, meaning ‘having the feet opposite’. Writing in 1398, John de Trevisa described the Antipodes who lived in Ethiopia as ‘men that have their feet against our feet’.