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Nov 21, 2012
This week's theme
Eponyms

This week's words
serendipity
mithridatism
rhadamanthine
elysian
icarian

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A.Word.A.Day
with Anu Garg

rhadamanthine

PRONUNCIATION:
(rad-a-MAN-thin, -thyn)

MEANING:
adjective: Inflexibly just or severe.

ETYMOLOGY:
In Greek mythology, Rhadamanthus was the son of Zeus and Europa. He was a judge of the underworld and known for his strict justice. Earliest documented use: 1778.

USAGE:
"Antoine Christophe Saliceti returned to his home island in the role of inflexible ideologue ... dispensing rhadamanthine justice."
Steven Englund; Napoleon: A Political Life; Scribner; 2003.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:
No man, for any considerable period, can wear one face to himself and another to the multitude, without finally getting bewildered as to which may be true. -Nathaniel Hawthorne, writer (1804-1864)

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