Sunday Word: Ouroboros

[sallymn]

ouroboros [oor-uh-bur-uhs, oor-oh-bawr-uhs yoor-]

noun:
1 a representation of a snake or dragon eating its own tail, originating in Ancient Egyptian and Greek iconography and used as a symbolic representation of wholeness, eternity, or death and rebirth.

2 anything that resembles or calls to mind a snake or dragon eating its own tail

Examples:

Trauma is a time traveller, an ouroboros that reaches back and devours everything that came before. Only fragments remain. (Junot Díaz, The Silence: The Legacy of Childhood Trauma, neoseeker, April 2018)

The ancient, mystical image of a snake swallowing its tail is called an ouroboros. It symbolizes the endless cycle of birth, life, death and rebirth. What should we call an Alexa smart speaker swallowing itself? Progress? (John Kelly, An annoyed radio listener reports that Alexa is awoken by mistake, The Washington Post, May 2022)

But as Hollywood continues its transformation into a reboot ouroboros of unoriginal ideas, I have a tiny bit of fear that these projects will be disasters. (Miles Surrey, The Summer of 2018 in Pop Culture Has Been Scary, neoseeker, July 2018)

The Ouroboros, the serpent eating its own tail, is a visual metaphor deployed to shift commonly held perspectives on, especially, the relationship between art and money. (Miles Surrey, Revised Book Proposal, Creative Infrastructure, November 2017)

The Ouroboros is a symbol steeped in history. Tied to the ancient art of alchemy, the Ouroboros travelled from ancient Egypt to Greece, and is often associated with the emotionally charged meaning of life's cyclical nature. (What is An Antique Split Ring, Lillicoco, March 2022)

        
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Origin:

borrowed from Late Greek ourobóros 'devouring (its) tail' (modifying drákōn 'dragon, snake') from Greek ourá 'tail' + -o- + -boros, nominal derivative from the base of bibroskein 'to eat, eat up, devour'(Merriam-Webster)