Paphian
Americanadjective
-
of or relating to Paphos, an ancient city of Cyprus sacred to Aphrodite.
-
of or relating to love, especially illicit sexual love; erotic; wanton.
-
noting or pertaining to Aphrodite or to her worship or service.
noun
-
the Paphian, Aphrodite: so called from her cult center at Paphos.
-
(often lowercase) a prostitute.
adjective
-
of or relating to Paphos
-
of or relating to Aphrodite
-
literary of sexual love
Etymology
Origin of Paphian
1605–15; < Latin Paphi ( us ) (< Greek Páphios of Paphos, of Aphrodite) + -an
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.
Look—where beside the garden-pool A Venus rises in the grove, More suave, more debonair, more cool Than ever burned with Paphian love.
From Mr. Faust by Ficke, Arthur Davison
And yet I heard Her darkly bid the Paphian be gone—— From here—without her.
From Yolanda of Cyprus by Rice, Cale Young
"Ah yet, the Idalian rose is red, And bright the Paphian foam: For all your Galilæan tears We turn to her," men say ...
From Collected Poems Volume One by Noyes, Alfred
It was there, too, I saw a Venus, radiant in innocence and beauty and sweetness and grace, as if new ‘bathed in Paphian foam’—the only Venus I ever could have loved.
From Cities of the Dawn by Ritchie, J. Ewing (James Ewing)
It was here that Emerson wrote Nature; for he was then an inhabitant of the Manse, and used to watch the Assyrian dawn and Paphian sunset and moonrise from the summit of our eastern hill.
From The Old Manse (From "Mosses from an Old Manse") by Hawthorne, Nathaniel
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
