panacea

See also: Panacea

English

WOTD – 15 November 2007

Alternative forms

Etymology

From Latin panacēa, from Ancient Greek πανάκεια (panákeia), from πανακής (panakḗs, all-healing), from πᾶν (pân, all) (equivalent to English pan-) + ἄκος (ákos, cure).

Pronunciation

  • (Received Pronunciation, US) enPR: păn"ə-sē'ə, IPA(key): /ˌpæn.əˈsiː.ə/
  • (file)
  • Rhymes: -iːə

Noun

panacea (plural panaceas or panaceæ)

  1. A remedy believed to cure all disease and prolong life that was originally sought by alchemists; a cure-all.
  2. Something that will solve all problems.
    A monorail will be a panacea for our traffic woes.
  3. (obsolete) The plant allheal (Valeriana officinalis), believed to cure all ills.
    • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, III.v:
      There, whether it diuine Tobacco were, / Or Panachæa, or Polygony, / She found, and brought it to her patient deare []

Synonyms

Translations

See also


Italian

Etymology

From Latin panacēa, from Ancient Greek πανάκεια (panákeia), from πανακής (panakḗs, all-healing), from πᾶν (pân, all) + ἄκος (ákos, cure).

Noun

panacea f (plural panacee)

  1. panacea, cure-all

Latin

Etymology

From Ancient Greek πανάκεια (panákeia), from πανακής (panakḗs, all-healing), from πᾶν (pân, all) + ἄκος (ákos, cure).

Pronunciation

Noun

panacēa f (genitive panacēae); first declension

  1. A particular kind of plant, believed to cure all diseases.
  2. panacea, catholicon.

Inflection

First declension.

Case Singular Plural
Nominative panacēa panacēae
Genitive panacēae panacēārum
Dative panacēae panacēīs
Accusative panacēam panacēās
Ablative panacēā panacēīs
Vocative panacēa panacēae

Derived terms

Descendants

References

  • panacea in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  • panacea in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
  • panacea in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire Illustré Latin-Français, Hachette
  • panacea in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898) Harper's Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers

Spanish

Etymology

From Latin panacēa, Ancient Greek πανάκεια (panákeia), from πανακής (panakḗs, all-healing), from πᾶν (pân, all) + ἄκος (ákos, cure).

Noun

panacea f (plural panaceas)

  1. panacea
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