Adamant
Charlene wrote to say
that she had encountered the word adamant in a historical novel that she is
currently reading. “I thought that it referred to a person secure in her
belief,” she wrote, “but in the book it seems to mean a precious stone of some
kind. Can you shed some light on this?”
Charlene is correct. In
our day, adamant means unwavering and unshakeable in belief. The adamant person
cannot be persuaded to change his or her mind. In fact, there is a whiff of
inflexibility and downright stubbornness involved.
The Latin word from
which it is derived originally meant a very hard substance. Sometimes it
referred to steel, and sometimes to a diamond. Its Greek predecessor meant
unbreakable. In time, the word was used metaphorically to signify something not
easily destroyed or overcome.
Interestingly, a number
of animals turn up in informal synonyms for adamant, including bull-headed,
dogged, mulish, and pig-headed.
Available from McFarland & Co.: Word Parts
Dictionary, 2nd edition
Nook edition
Nook edition
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posted by Michael J. Sheehan at 10:15 AM
1 Comments:
More about Adamant:
It is also the name of a hapless foppish former pop star
And it is also the root of the fiction element "adamantium", perhaps best well known for the superhero Wolverine's claws.
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