hendiadys

[ hen-dahy-uh-dis ]

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

/ 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

Word History and Origins

Origin of hendiadys¹

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

Word History and Origins

Origin of hendiadys¹

C16: from Medieval Latin, changed from Greek phrase hen dia duoin, literally: one through two

Example Sentences

A run of doubled-up terms—the tautological “impious and nefarious,” “misfortune and injury,” and the hendiadys “wickedness and atrocity” help inflate his final denunciation of the traitor: With these omens, O Catiline, be gone to your impious and nefarious war, to the great safety of the republic, to your own misfortune and injury, and to the destruction of those who have joined themselves to you in every wickedness and atrocity.

From Literature

Hendiadys, hen-dī′a-dis, n. a rhetorical figure in which one and the same notion is presented in two expressions, as 'with might and main'=by main strength.

From Project Gutenberg

At first recitation The Roman flunked Stover on the review, on the gerund and gerundive, on the use of hendiadys—a most unfair exhibition of persecution—on several supines, and requested him to remain after class.

From Project Gutenberg

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 Project Gutenberg

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

From Project Gutenberg