hendiadys

American  

[hen-dahy-uh-dis] / hɛnˈdaɪ ə dɪs /

noun

Rhetoric.

1. a figure in which a complex idea is expressed by two words connected by a copulative conjunction: “to look with eyes and envy” instead of “with envious eyes.”

---

hendiadys British  

/ hɛnˈdaɪədɪs /

noun

1. a rhetorical device by which two nouns joined by a conjunction, usually and, are used instead of a noun and a modifier, as in to run with fear and haste instead of to run with fearful haste

---

Etymology

Origin of hendiadys

1580–90; < Medieval Latin; alteration of Greek phrase hèn dià dyoîn one through two, one by means of two

Example Sentences

A hendiadys for 'Go drink all the mind-purging hellebore that grows in Anticyra'.

From The Last Poems of Ovid by Akrigg, Mark Bear

The MS. authority is decidedly in favour of this, the more difficult reading; and the hendiadys is not more violent than those in Georg. ii.

From The Aeneid of Virgil by Virgil

At EP I ii 77 he solves the difficulty through hendiadys: 'quid Sauromatae faciant, quid Iazyges acres'.

From The Last Poems of Ovid by Akrigg, Mark Bear

This line is a type of hendiadys, the first half of the line being redefined by the second.

From The Last Poems of Ovid by Akrigg, Mark Bear