gnomic
1- of, relating to, or resembling a gnome.
Origin of gnomic
1gnomic
2- like or containing gnomes or aphorisms.
- of, relating to, or noting a writer of aphorisms, especially any of certain Greek poets.
Origin of gnomic
2Related Words for gnomic
precise, curt, cryptic, incisive, concise, brusque, laconic, pithy, succinct, elliptical, trenchant, abrupt, clear-cut, close, compact, compendious, condensed, crisp, epigrammatic, exactExamples from the Web for gnomic
Contemporary Examples of gnomic
He would have looked very well as a priest: the shabby, gnomic variety one sees in small Italian towns.
Iran’s Top Spy Is the Modern-Day Karla, John Le Carré’s Villainous MastermindMichael Weiss
July 2, 2014
Dyer uses this kind of gnomic, prophetic, baffling language all the time, and it can be trying and vague.
Historical Examples of gnomic
They often say in their Gnomic aphorisms, ‘Even the Gods cannot alter the past.’
De ProfundisOscar Wilde
His method is gnomic, laconic, oracular; never persuasive or plausible.
Suspended JudgmentsJohn Cowper Powys
He is a Gnomic Poet; and he is so, because he is emphatically the poet of man.
A Letter on Shakspere's Authorship of The Two Noble KinsmenWilliam Spalding
The Gnomic poets and the Seven Sages had crystallized morality in apothegms.
Studies of the Greek Poets (Vol II of 2)John Addington Symonds
The Gnomic poets show how guilt, if unavenged at the moment, brings calamity upon the offspring of the evil-doer.
Studies of the Greek Poets (Vol II of 2)John Addington Symonds
gnomic
gnomical
- consisting of, containing, or relating to gnomes or aphorisms
- of or relating to a writer of such sayings
Word Origin and History for gnomic
"full of instructive sayings," 1815, from French gnomique (18c.) and directly from Late Latin gnomicus "concerned with maxims, didactic," from Greek gnomikos, from gnome "thought, opinion, maxim, intelligence," from root of gignoskein "to come to know" (see gnostic). English gnome meant "short, pithy statement of general truth" (1570s). Gnomical is attested from 1610s.