Origin and history of Attica

city of ancient Attica, capital of modern Greece, from Greek Athenai (plural because the city had several distinct parts), traditionally derived from Athena, but probably assimilated from a lost name in a pre-Hellenic language.

1590s, "pertaining to Attica" (q.v.), the region around Athens, from Latin Atticus "Athenian," from Greek Attikos "Athenian, of Attica." The Attic dialect came to be regarded as the literary standard of ancient Greece, and it passed into the koine of the Alexandrine and Roman periods. The word is attested from 1560s as an architectural term for a type of column base.