This week's theme
Eponyms

This week's words
silhouette
casanova
xanthippe
shrapnel
Don Juan

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A.Word.A.Day

PRONUNCIATION:

(zan-THIP-ee, -TIP-)

MEANING:

noun: A nagging, ill-tempered woman.

ETYMOLOGY:

After Xanthippe, wife of Socrates (c. 5 century BCE) who has been portrayed as a nagging, quarrelsome woman. The name Xanthippe is from xanthos (yellow) + hippos (horse). Also see xanthodontous. Earliest documented use: 1691.

NOTES:

Socrates is said to have advised, "By all means marry; if you get a good wife, you'll be happy. If you get a bad one, you'll become a philosopher." It's not known what Socrates thought would happen if the roles were reversed. Also, there's the question of which came first: philosophizing or being ill-tempered. Would being married to a philosopher turn a woman into a shrew?

USAGE:

Mistress Foster is a grasping shrew, a Xanthippe, who bosses her husband about."
Jean Howard; Theater of a City: The Places of London Comedy; University of Pennsylvania Press; 2009.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY: