adamant
From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
Alternative forms
Etymology
From Middle English adamant, adamaunt, from Latin adamantem, accusative singular form of adamās (“hard as steel”), from Ancient Greek ἀδάμας (adámas, “invincible”), from ἀ- (a-, “not”) + δαμάζω (damázō, “I tame”) or of Semitic origin. Doublet of diamond.
Pronunciation
Adjective
adamant (comparative more adamant, superlative most adamant)
- (said of people and their conviction) Firm; unshakeable; unyielding; determined.
- 2002, Charles Moncrief, Wildcatters: The True Story of how Conspiracy, Greed and the IRS ..., page 195:
- Broiles and Kirkley were adamant about getting out of the lawsuit, but Mike and Dee were equally adamant about not wanting to sign a letter of apology
- 2006, Cara E. C. Vermaak, Confessions of the Dyslexic Virgin, page 275:
- Johan is determined to play the field and adamant about never committing.
- 2010, Deeanne Gist, Maid to Match, page 94:
- What good would such foolishness do a mountain man? But Pa had been adamant. Just as he'd been adamant about their reading, writing, numbers, geography, and languages. Just as he'd been adamant about using proper grammar
- (of an object) Very difficult to break, pierce, or cut.
- 1956, Arthur C. Clarke, The City and the Stars, page 34:
- Unprotected matter, however adamant, would have been ground to dust ages ago.
Synonyms
- See also Thesaurus:obstinate
Translations
determined; unshakeable; unyielding
Noun
adamant (plural adamants)
- An imaginary rock or mineral of impenetrable hardness; a name given to the diamond and other substances of extreme hardness.
- 1582, Robert Parsons, chapter 8, in The first booke of the Christian exercise, appertayning to resolution, G. Flinton:
- This then is and alwayes hath ben the fashion of Worldlinges, & reprobate persons, to harden their hartes as an adamant stone, against anye thinge that shalbe tolde the for amendement of their lives, and for the savinge of their soules.
- 1611, King James Translators, Ezekiel 3:9:
- As an adamant harder than flint have I made thy forehead …
- 1831, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter XV, in Romance and Reality. […], volume I, London: Henry Colburn and Richard Bentley, […], →OCLC, page 162:
- But this was a finale she ever avoided: an offer, like the rock of adamant in Sinbad's voyages, finishes the attraction by destroying the vessel;...
- An embodiment of impregnable hardness.
- 1907, E.M. Forster, The Longest Journey, Part I, XV [Uniform ed., p. 163]:
- Actual life might seem to her so real that she could not detect the union of shadow and adamant that men call poetry.
- 1907, E.M. Forster, The Longest Journey, Part I, XV [Uniform ed., p. 163]:
- (archaic) A lodestone.
- c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “A Midsommer Nights Dreame”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, (please specify the act number in uppercase Roman numerals, and the scene number in lowercase Roman numerals):
- You draw me, you hard-hearted adamant:
But yet you draw not iron, for all my heart
Is true as steel. Leave you your power to draw,
And I shall have no power to follow you.
- (obsolete or historical) A substance that neutralizes lodestones.
- 1657 [1608], Jean de Renou, translated by Richard Tomlinson, A Medicinal Dispensatory […], page 418:
- An Adamant hinders the attractive vertue, as also Garlick rubbed on the Magnet; for its attractive faculty is not so valid, but it may be easily deluded, obscured, and superated […]
Translations
rock or mineral
|
embodiment of hardness
lodestone — see lodestone
See also
- (imaginary desirably hard material): unobtainium
Derived terms
- adamance (noun)
- adamantane (noun)
- adamantean (adjective)
- adamantine (adjective)
- adamantly (adverb)
- adamantium (noun)
Further reading
- “adamant”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
- “adamant”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
Pronunciation
Noun
adamant m (plural adamantow)
Noun
adamant f (genitive singular adamainte, nominative plural adamaintí)
- Alternative form of adhmaint (“adamant, lodestone; magnet”)
Declension
|
Bare forms
|
Forms with the definite article
|
Declension of adamant
Mutation
| Irish mutation | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Radical | Eclipsis | with h-prothesis | with t-prothesis |
| adamant | n-adamant | hadamant | not applicable |
| Note: Some of these forms may be hypothetical. Not every possible mutated form of every word actually occurs. | |||
Further reading
- Ó Dónaill, Niall (1977) “adamant”, in Foclóir Gaeilge–Béarla, Dublin: An Gúm, →ISBN
Verb
adamant
Alternative forms
Etymology
Learned borrowing from Latin adamantem, accusative of adamās, from Ancient Greek ἀδάμας (adámas). Doublet of dyamaunt and adamas.
Pronunciation
Noun
adamant (plural adamants)
- adamant, adamantine (valuable gemstone)
- An invulnerable or indomitable object
- A natural magnet; magnetite.
Related terms
Descendants
Further reading
- “adama(u)nt, n.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 2018-05-11.
Alternative forms
Etymology
(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)
Noun
adamant oblique singular, ? (oblique plural adamanz or adamantz, nominative singular adamant, nominative plural adamanz or adamantz)
Further reading
adamant in Anglo-Norman Dictionary, Aberystwyth University, 2022
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