timonean
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 0.00 in modern English
10
Scrabble Score
8
Letters
4
Syllables
7
Unique Chars
Meaning
adj
Of a form of bitter misanthropy related to Timonism, like Timon of Athens.
adj
Pertaining or related to Timon of Phlius, his life, works, style, or ideas.
Example Sentences
- "Solitude, on the contrary, not only deprives us of both the past and the future, but always inclines the present hour to joyless melancholy, which sooner or later ends in something intractable, Timonean, (pardon the word) or perhaps more fatal."
- "Such was the account Mr. Hobart gave me of himself, (which made me admire him much, as he was but fifty then) and to convince me his temper had nothing Timonean or unsocial in it from his solitary life, he requested I would dine with him."
- "And so in love with his Timonean solitude was Rozoko, that it needed many bribes and bland persuasions, to induce him to desert his mossy, hillside, misanthropic cave, for the distracting tumult of a court."
- "Since only a small percentage of Timon's oeuvre has survived and much of Callimachus' work is equally fragmentary there are no direct quotes or precise allusions, but it is possible to discern some features of Callimachus' work that seem remarkably Timonean."
Etymology
From Timon + -ean, after the 5th-century-BCE person Timon of Athens (as described by Plutarch, Lucian, and Aristophanes), possibly by way of William Shakespeare's play Timon of Athens (c. 1607). Used by John Toland in a letter (c. 1710–1722), apparently as a rare word or neologism, and by Thomas Amory in The Life of John Buncle (volume II; 1766), as a regular word.
Word Breakdown
Inflected Forms
more Timonean (comparative)
most Timonean (superlative)