'Eros' originates from Ancient Greek, specifically the word 'Ἔρως' (Érōs), where the root is associated with 'love' and 'desire'.

'Eros' was taken into Latin as 'Eros' and later entered English via classical and scholarly texts in the Middle English and Renaissance periods, retaining the name of the deity and the abstract sense of erotic love.

Initially, it referred primarily to the Greek deity of love; over time it also came to denote sexual or romantic love more generally and was later adopted in psychoanalytic theory to mean the life instinct.