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View synonyms for Achilles heel
Achilles heel
or Achilles' heel
noun
- a portion, spot, area, or the like, that is especially or solely vulnerable:
His Achilles heel is his quick temper.
Achilles heel
noun
- a small but fatal weakness
Achilles' heel
- A point of vulnerability. ( See Achilles .)
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Word History and Origins
Origin of Achilles heel1
First recorded in 1800–10
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Idioms and Phrases
A fatal weakness, a vulnerable area, as in This division, which is rarely profitable, is the company's Achilles' heel . The term alludes to the Greek legend about the heroic warrior Achilles whose mother tried to make him immortal by holding the infant by his heel and dipping him into the River Styx. Eventually he was killed by an arrow shot into his undipped heel. [c. 1800]Advertisement
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.
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