macro- In ancient Greek makro- was a common combining form based on makros ‘large, long’. Some of the Greek words passed into Latin and thence into other languages, and these borrowings began to appear in English from the early 17th century. Since macro- often implies ‘reletively large’, macro- words often have a companion word formed with micro- ‘small’. Thus macrocosm [E17th] ‘large world, universe’ has a companion microcosm [LME] ‘little world, universe’ (see also microbe). Macrobiotic [L18th] originally meant ‘tending to prolong life’ and was borrowed via German Makrobiotik from Greek makrobiotes ‘longevity’. The sense of a type of diet was borrowed this time from French macrobiotique and did not appear in English until 1956. The computing macro [M20] is a shortening of macro instruction, a single instruction that expands automatically into a set of instructions for a particular task. See also mega-.