Androcles

American

[an-druh-kleez] / ˈæn drəˌkliz /

Also Androclus

noun

Roman Legend.

a slave who was spared in the arena by a lion from whose foot he had long before extracted a thorn.

Androcles British

/ ˈændrəˌkliːz, ˈændrəkləs /

noun

(in Roman legend) a slave whose life was spared in the arena by a lion from whose paw he had once extracted a thorn

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

Born in Kuala Lumpur, Gough started his career in the 1946 television movie Androcles and the Lion.

From BBC • Mar. 17, 2011

He has two TV specials coming up the same week next month�as host of NBC's high-rating annual Ice Follies show and as Ferrovius in a Richard Rodgers musical adaptation of Androcles and the Lion.

From Time Magazine Archive

One suggested that the beast cut its paw on a Coca-Cola bottle, another thought the lion was a character actor from a traveling troupe of Shaw's Androcles and the Lion.

From Time Magazine Archive

Meek Androcles and his shrewish wife, for example, became a kind of antique Maggie & Jiggs.

From Time Magazine Archive

Androcles found that the beast, far from resenting this familiarity, received it with the greatest gentleness, and seemed to invite him by his blandishments to proceed.

From The History of Sandford and Merton by Day, Thomas

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023