Soulmate, twin flame: where these words come from
Soulmate and twin flame are two words of very different ages: one goes back to ancient Greece, the other to a nineteenth-century novel.
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- myth
- vocabulary
Origins at a glance
For you, knowing how long a word has existed takes nothing away from your experience; it helps tell apart what the story says from what your relationship shows.
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The soulmate, an ancient image
In the 4th century BCE, Plato has Aristophanes tell, in the Symposium, a myth that has remained famous: the first humans were cut in two, and each half has been searching ever since for the one it lacks. Love becomes the desire to regain wholeness. Other traditions carry a similar idea, that of a person who is destined for you. The English word soul-mate is much later: it first appears in writing from Coleridge, in a letter of 1822.
The twin flame, born in a novel
The expression “twin flame” appears in the third chapter of A Romance of Two Worlds, a novel by Marie Corelli published in 1886. More than a century later, Elizabeth Clare Prophet published Soul Mates and Twin Flames (1999), which the press credits as the book that made the current version of this idea popular. The word is therefore recent on the scale of spiritual traditions, which says nothing about the strength of what the people who use it feel.
From social media to everyday vocabulary
The online dictionary Dictionary.com notes that the term has been in use since at least the early 1990s, and that it spread far more widely in the early 2020s, carried by social media. This rapid spread goes hand in hand with a great variety of definitions: each author, each account adds their own signs and stages. Dating a word is not the same as judging it: a new term can name an old experience.
Facts and sources
- The myth of Aristophanes, in Plato’s Symposium (4th century BCE), describes humans cut in two who seek their other half. Plato, Symposium, 189c–193d
- The English word soul-mate is first attested in a letter by Coleridge dated 1822. Wikipedia (en), “Soulmate,” reread on October 15, 2026
- “Twin flame” appears in Marie Corelli’s A Romance of Two Worlds (1886), in chapter III. Project Gutenberg no. 4394, read on October 12, 2026
- Elizabeth Clare Prophet published Soul Mates and Twin Flames in 1999; the press sees it as the book that popularized the contemporary idea of the twin flame. Wikipedia (en), “Twin Flames Universe,” reread on October 15, 2026 (after Vox, November 14, 2023, and Vanity Fair); Open Library. Corrected: “1970s” not attested.
- Dictionary.com dates the common use of the term “since at least the early 1990s” and its rise through social media to the early 2020s. Dictionary.com, Pop Culture, “twin flame” (dictionary.com/e/pop-culture/twin-flame), reread on October 15, 2026: “used since at least the early 1990s”; “wider popularity in the early 2020s due to widespread usage on social media”
Beliefs reported from the named authors: a mirror for reflecting on your relationship, never a prediction or a verdict on a person.
Origins: your questions
Where does the expression soulmate come from?
The image goes back to the myth of Aristophanes as reported by Plato in the Symposium: double beings, separated by Zeus, each part of which would seek the other. The English word soul-mate is first attested in 1822, in a letter from Coleridge. Other languages express the same idea of a deep kinship between two souls.
Who invented the term twin flame?
No one invented it alone. Its earliest recorded use is found in the novelist Marie Corelli, in 1886. The book that Elizabeth Clare Prophet devoted to the subject in 1999 is often considered the one that made it known, before social media spread it widely in the early 2020s.
Is a recent word less true?
No. A word’s age tells you about its history, not about the worth of what people experience. Many old experiences were only named late. What can be judged in a relationship is the actions: respect, freedom, shared attention, far more than the label chosen.
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