Aesopian

American  

[ee-soh-pee-uhn, ee-sop-ee-] / iˈsoʊ pi ən, iˈsɒp i- /

Also Aesopic

adjective

1. of, relating to, or characteristic of Aesop or his fables.

   a story that points an Aesopian moral.

2. conveying meaning by hint, euphemism, innuendo, or the like.

   In the candidate's Aesopian language, “soft on Communism” was to be interpreted as “Communist sympathizer.”

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Etymology

Origin of Aesopian

1870–75; < Late Latin Aesōpi ( us ) + -an

Example Sentences

If Brasher sometimes tends to moralize when he writes about birds, it isn’t Aesopian.

From Washington Post • Apr. 29, 2023

Beast epics used some of the Aesopian material, but they were much longer and more novelistic.

From The New Yorker • Apr. 27, 2015

Terry has noticed, as have others, the Aesopian motifs that occur, and includes slender, playful versions, sometimes modernised, of Aesop's fables himself.

From The Guardian • May 28, 2013

Some are funny, some are pithy, and as often as not they are used to draw an Aesopian moral or to make a contemporary point.

From Time Magazine Archive

In it the Aesopian fable received a development which was in several respects quite original.

From Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 10, Slice 1 "Evangelical Church Conference" to "Fairbairn, Sir William" by Various