Word of the Day!

mythopoeic [mith-uh-pee-ik]

adjective:
1 of or relating to the making of myths
2 serving to create or engender myths; productive in mythmaking

Examples:

Gloria Steinem's New York is a bit like everyone's: a mythopoeic territory at the intersection of real estate, restaurants and workaholism, with bits of love, sex and ambition thrown in. (John Leland, What I Learned About a Vanished New York From Gloria Steinem, The New York Times, October 2016)

Shelley had turned it into a mythopoeic representation of the Romantic poet Keats 'butchered' by critics. (Kaiser Haq, The poet as mythopoeic hero: Adonis, Dhaka Tribune, November 2017)

Like most big cosmic ideas, this one has almost certainly been purloined, ornamented and abused more than once in the vast works of mythopoeic bricolage which DC and Marvel, America's main comic-book publishers, have provided to the world over the past decades. (O M, The growth of Marvel's universe through 'Black Panther' is welcome, The Economist, February 2018)

A lot of thought went into that visual and mythopoeic synthesis, which also incorporates a strong element of Celtic and Germanic folklore. (Mike Hale, 'Carnival Row' review: Nothing new to see here, Gulf News, September 2019)

Perhaps Charles Strickland's power and originality would scarcely have sufficed to turn the scale if the remarkable mythopoeic faculty of mankind had not brushed aside with impatience a story which disappointed all its craving for the extraordinary. (W Somerset Maugham, The Moon and Sixpence)

Haggard is the text-book case of the mythopoeic gift pure and simple... Haggard's best work will survive because it is based on an appeal well above high-water mark. The fullest tides of fashion cannot demolish it. A great myth is relevant as long as the predicament of humanity lasts; as long as humanity lasts. (W Somerset Maugham, C. S. Lewis, 'The Mythopoeic Gift of Rider Haggard')

Origin:

'pertaining to the creation of myths, giving rise to myths,' 1843, from Greek mythopoios, from mythos + poiein 'to make, create'. (Online Etymology Dictionary)

myrmidon [mur-mi-don, -dn]

noun:
faithful follower who carries out orders without question; a subordinate who executes orders unquestioningly or unscrupulously

Examples:

These days Tate's name pops up occasionally in bookstores, never in cafés: he's simply not part of the contemporary discussion. Literary history and her myrmidons, the anthologists, have hacked down his poetic ranks - often to a single poem, 'Ode to the Confederate Dead' - and left the rest to lie where they fell, out of print. (David Yezzi, The violence of Allen Tate, The New Criterion, September 2001)

OK, first of all, George III didn't have myrmidons (Charles P Pierce, This Week In The Laboratories Of Democracy, Esquire, March 2014)

He was merely bored when Thrush tried to distract him with some account of the murder in which he himself was only interested because his myrmidon happened to have discovered the body. (E W Hornung, The Camera Fiend)

His myrmidon on this occasion was a little, red-nosed butler, who waddled about the house after his master, while the latter bounced from room to room like a cracker. (Thomas Love Peacock, Headlong Hall)

'"We are gathered," he ses, "to consider what can be done for the defence of our sainted Brother Lawley, who's in the hands of the myrmidons of the law." (Edgar Wallace, The Man Who Shot the "Favourite" (The Gold Mine))

Origin:

one of a warlike people of ancient Thessaly, legendarily ruled by Achilles and accompanying him to Troy, c. 1400, from Latin Myrmidones (plural), from Greek Myrmidones, Thessalian tribe led by Achilles to the Trojan War, fabled to have been ants changed into men, and often derived from Greek myrmex 'ant' (from PIE morwi- ), but Watkins does not connect them and Klein's sources suggest a connection to Greek mormos 'dread, terror.' Transferred sense of 'faithful unquestioning follower,' often with a suggestion of unscrupulousness, is from c. 1600. (Online Etymology Dictionary)

The Myrmidons, legendary inhabitants of Thessaly in Greece, were known for their fierce devotion to Achilles, the king who led them in the Trojan War. Myrmex means 'ant' in Greek, an image that evokes small and insignificant workers mindlessly fulfilling their duties. Whether the original Myrmidons were given their name for that reason is open to question. The 'ant' association is strong, however. Some say the name is from a legendary ancestor who once had the form of an ant; others say the Myrmidons were actually transformed from ants. In any case, since the 1400s, we've employed myrmidon in its not-always-complimentary, ant-evoking, figurative sense. (Merriam-Webster)

aegis [ee-jis]

noun:
1 (classical mythology) the shield or breastplate of Zeus or Athena, bearing at its center the head of the Gorgon
2 protection, support
3 under the imperial aegis
4 sponsorship, auspices

Examples:

The International Dota 2 tournament is set up to be an incredible match between the two very best teams in the world right now. There are incredible stories on both sides, but only one team will be able to lift the aegis and become world champions. (Mike Stubbs, The International Final Is Set Up To Be The Best 'Dota 2' Match Ever, Forbes, September 2024)

My visit was courtesy of Google Art Project, which, in the case of the Met, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Kunsthistorisches Museum, the Rijksmuseum, and a number of other institutions, offers partial glimpses, via Google Street View, into great art and archeology sites around the world, under the aegis of the company's Cultural Institute. (Alexandra Schwartz, Alone in the Virtual Museum, Tribune India, September 2014)

The chiefs about the son of Atreus chose their men and marshalled them, while Minerva went among them holding her priceless aegis that knows neither age nor death. (Homer, The Iliad)

Further, great mystery shrouds the particulars of their overthrow when the aegis of the Roman authority was withdrawn. (James Oliver Bevan, The Towns of Roman Britain)

He had never contemplated the possession of power except under the aegis of some commanding chief. (Benjamin Disraeli, Endymion)

Origin:

'protection,' 1793, a figurative use of Latin aegis, from Greek Aigis, the name of the shield of Zeus, a word said by Herodotus to be related to aix (genitive aigos) 'goat,' from PIE aig- 'goat' (source also of Sanskrit ajah, Lithuanian ožys 'he-goat'), as the shield was of goatskin (Online Etymology Dictionary)

English borrowed aegis from Latin, but the word ultimately comes from the Greek noun aigís, meaning 'goatskin.' In ancient Greek mythology, an aegis was something that offered physical protection. It has been depicted in various ways, including as a magical protective cloak made from the skin of the goat that suckled Zeus as an infant, and as a shield fashioned by Hephaestus that bore the severed head of the Gorgon Medusa. The word first entered English in the 15th century as a noun referring to the shield or breastplate associated with Zeus or Athena. It later took on a more general sense of 'protection' and, by the late-19th century, it had acquired the extended senses of 'auspices' and 'sponsorship.' (Merriam-Webster)

peripatetic [per-uh-puh-tet-ik]

adjective:
1 of, relating to, or given to walking
2 moving or traveling from place to place; itinerant
noun:
1 a person who walks or travels about
2 (initial capital letter) a member of the Aristotelian school

Examples:

When he pulls up at Lark Hall, a ramshackle seaside house that has been turned into a retirement home, he knows it is the final stop in his peripatetic itinerary. (Stephen Holden, Caine breathes life into film on old age, The Herald Tribune, May 2009)

And Witold, who leads the peripatetic life of a travelling artist, must serve as a local trinket, a curio, for the global flow of commerce. (Jennifer Wilson, J M Coetzee's Interlingual Romance, The New Yorker, September 2023)

I've always been peripatetic, so I'm happy to live in lots of places. (Nicole Elphick, Michael Snelling's secret Sydney, The Guardian, October 2015)

This duty discharged, he subsided into the bosom of the family; and, entertaining himself with a strolling or peripatetic breakfast, watched, with genteel indifference, the process of loading the carriage. (Charles Dickens, The Old Curiosity Shop)

There were the Italian peripatetic vendors of weather-glasses, who had their headquarters at Norwich. (Herbert Jenkins, The Life of George Borrow)

(click to enlarge)

mid-15c, Peripatetik, 'a disciple of Aristotle, one of the set of philosophers who followed the teachings of Aristotle,' from Old French perypatetique (14c) and directly from Medieval Latin peripateticus 'pertaining to the disciples or philosophy of Aristotle,' from Greek peripatētikos 'given to walking about' (especially while teaching), from peripatein 'walk up and down, walk about,' from peri 'around, about' + patein 'to walk, tread'. Aristotle's custom was to teach while strolling through the Lyceum in Athens. In English, the philosophical meaning is older than that of 'person who wanders about' (1610s). As an adjective, 'walking about from place to place, itinerant,' from 1640s, often with a tinge of humor. (Online Etymology Dictionary)

Are you someone who likes to think on your feet? If so, you've got something in common with the followers of the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle. Not only a thinker and teacher, Aristotle was also a walker, and his students were required to walk along beside him as he lectured while pacing to and fro. Thus it was that the Greek word peripatētikos (from peripatein, meaning 'to walk up and down') came to be associated with Aristotle and his followers. By the way, the covered walk in the Lyceum where Aristotle taught was known as the 'peripatos' (which can either refer to the act of walking or a place for walking). (Merriam-Webster)

atavistic [at-uh-vis-tik]

adjective:
reverting to or suggesting the characteristics of a remote ancestor or primitive type.

Examples:

As I see it, the real pleasure of the taxi whistle is its outmodedness; the core of its charm is atavistic. In a world where virtually everything we do is mediated by technology, taxi-whistling is old-fashioned and physical: With just two fingers and one not even very deep breath, you can produce a delightful, if slightly shocking, noise. (Jon Gluck, The Robots Can’t Take Taxi-Whistling Away From Me, Albert Lea Tribune, March 2023)

How I wish scientists and technologists would give up this race to create convincing human simulacra - let's face it: the atavistic shudder they provoke will never dwindle. These automatons of artificial skin will never not be uncanny, even if (especially if) they have your mum's face. (Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett, Digital humans give me the creeps – but there might be something in it, The Guardian, April 2014)

This is because puzzles train us to be more rigorous thinkers, less swayed by atavistic emotions. (A J Jacobs, Doing Puzzles Can Help Solve Your Other Problems, Too, TIME, May 2022)

For over 200 years, economists have largely accepted such arguments, although some politicians have displayed an atavistic fondness for protection. (Soumaya Keynes, The new order of trade, The Economist, October 2021)

And it was so easy to accept the atavistic memory and menace of myth - of alien life burrowing upward from inner Earth or swooping down from outer stars, of life that feeds upon us, fastens upon us to eat and drink with myriad, monstrous mouths. (Robert Bloch, The Selected Stories of Robert Bloch)

In time of peace in the modern world, if one is thoughtful and careful, it is rather more difficult to be killed or maimed in the outland places of the globe than it is in the streets of our great cities, but the atavistic urge toward danger persists and its satisfaction is called adventure. (John Steinbeck, The Log from the Sea of Cortez )

Origin:

"pertaining to atavism," 1847; from stem of atavism (1833, in biology, "reversion by influence of heredity to ancestral characteristics, resemblance of a given organism to some remote ancestor, return to an early or original type," from French atavisme, attested by 1820s, said to have been coined by French botanist Antoine-Nicolas Duchesne, from Latin atavus "ancestor, forefather," from at- perhaps here meaning "beyond" + avus "grandfather" ) + istic (adjectival word-forming element, from French -istique or directly from Latin -isticus, from Greek -istikos, a compound of the adjectival suffix -ikos + the noun suffix -istes). (Online Etymology Dictionary)

chthonian [thoh-nee-uhn]

adjective:
(classical mythology) of or relating to the deities, spirits, and other beings dwelling under the earth; of or relating to the underworld

Examples:

This terrestrial approach is almost alchemical and emphasized by the exhibition's title hermetic aspect: 'Sonde d'arc-en-taupe' mentions two complementary patterns, mole tunnels and rainbows, a way of linking the cosmos and the chthonian world, the stars and the underground. (Jean-Marie Appriou, Palais de Tokyo, February 2022)

So if The Dunwich Horror ends up happening and manages to be successful, I’ll bet a canvas bag full of chthonian artifacts that the third film will be The Shadow over Innsmouth. (Tom Reimann, Hollywood Has a Lovecraft Problem, Collider, February 2020)

This chthonian belief - that the world’s underbelly rumbles with life - guides all the so-called Earth-based faiths. (Michael Tortorello, If a Druid Rings the Doorbell, The New York Times, October 2013)

Our trains are not ambushed by dragons, suicide bombers, or chthonian tentacle monsters. Frankly, given the quality of the postprandial conversation, this is not a net positive. (Charles Stross, The Fuller Memorandum)

The chthonian deities form a counterpart to the dwellers on Olympus. (John Addington Symonds, Studies of the Greek Poets)

It must be strange to die, surrounded by jackals at their chthonian litanies. (Martin Swayne, In Mesopotamia)

Origin:

'of or pertaining to the under world,' 1882, with -ic + Latinized form of Greek khthonios 'of the earth, in the earth,' from khthōn 'the earth, solid surface of the earth' (mostly poetic), from PIE root dhghem- 'earth.' (Online Etymology Dictionary)

amorphous [uh-mawr-fuhs]

verb:
1 lacking definite form; having no specific shape; formless
2 of no particular kind or character; indeterminate; having no pattern or structure; unorganized


Examples:

It could seem like a drawback that both Ember and Wade are visually amorphous - the flames that constitute her body and the water that makes up his are in constant motion - but they're always clearly these two vivid, passionate characters. (Chris Hewitt, Pixar's 'Elemental' is a romantic but murky mix of fire and water, The Washington Post, June 2023)

When Wallace Neff began designing bubble houses, he believed it was his greatest architectural achievement. The trailblazing California architect was known for designing stately mansion for the Hollywood elite during the golden age of film, and these amorphous structures were certainly a departure from his previous work (Katherine McLaughlin, 9 Bubble Houses Around the World, Architectural Digest, July 2023)

Post Malone is, in many ways, the perfect embodiment of our current amorphous musical landscape, where questions surrounding authenticity and originality have become moot in the age of AI. (Alina Zaheer, Post Malone Austin Review: The Inevitability of Pop Formula, Slant, July 2023)

This was the shocking thing; that the slime of the pit seemed to utter cries and voices; that the amorphous dust gesticulated and sinned; that what was dead, and had no shape, should usurp the offices of life. (Robert Louis Stevenson, Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde)

Origin:

'shapeless, having no determined form,' 1731, from Modern Latin amorphus, from Greek amorphos 'without form, shapeless, deformed,' from a- 'without' + morphē 'form,' a word of uncertain etymology (Online Etymology Dictionary)

bibliotaph [bib-lee-uh-taf, -tahf]

noun:
a person who caches or hoards books; one who hides away books, as in a tomb

Examples:

Some were eager to see his original edition of the Communist Manifesto with Marx’s own scribbled marginalia; others, his upstairs study where this bibliotaph kept his greatest treasures under lock and key, including first editions of Spinoza’s Tractatus Theologico-Politicus, printed in Amsterdam in 1670, and Descartes’s Meditations, not to mention a Bomberg Hebrew Bible printed in Venice in 1521. (Jacob Heilbrunn, The Man With 20,000 Books, The National Interest, December 2015)

I am a bibliophile. I am also a bibliophage, and at times even a bibliotaph. Luckily, I’m not alone. (Anne Degrace, Bibliobrilliance comes to Nelson, Nelson Star, June 2016)

The late Sir Thomas Phillipps, of Middle Hill, was a remarkable instance of a bibliotaph. He bought bibliographical treasures simply to bury them. (William Blades, Enemies of Books)

The bibliotaph buries books; not literally, but sometimes with as much effect as if he had put his books underground. (Leon H Vincent, The Bibliotaph)

Doubtless he was a purposeful bibliotaph, otherwise those documents might not have survived those revolutionary times (Holbrook Jackson, The Anatomy of Bibliomania)

I am a bibliotaph. I hoard books. I bring them home from the library by the basket load until I sometimes wonder if the rest of the village isn't being deprived of its reading rights with nothing left on the shelves but a few volumes on how to improve their golf game. (Elizabeth Schuett, Cox News Service, January 2001)

Origin:

The term bibliotaph comes from French bibliotaphe, from biblio- + -taphe, the latter of which is from Greek taphos meaning 'tomb'. One famous tomb of books is that of German fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld. He is reported to have accumulated as many as 300,000 books. (Merriam-Webster)