victimary
English
editEtymology 1
editBorrowed from Middle French victimaire, from Latin victimārius, from victima + -ārius.[1]
Noun
editvictimary (plural victimaries)
- (historical) A person whose role it is to kill the sacrificial victim(s) during a ritual sacrifice.
- 1876, Richard Francis Burton, Etruscan Bologna: A Study, London: Smith, Elder & Co., page 43:
- Two of the ministri support a pole or brancard, from which hangs a situla (pail with handles); a third has charge of a huge ox, over whose head floats a bird like Progne; whilst a victimary drags by the horns a goat, sacred to Mars.
Etymology 2
editAdjective
editvictimary (comparative more victimary, superlative most victimary)
- (rare) Relating to victim(s) or victimhood.
- 2022, Catriona McAllister, Literary Reimaginings of Argentina's Independence: History, Fiction, Politics, Liverpool, Merseyside: Liverpool University Press, page 42:
- Ansay reinserts the victim at the heart of what the violence of independence can signify: the second part of the text leaves behind the revolutionary government's processes of self-construction and represents the experience of independence exclusively from this victimary perspective.
References
edit- ^ “victimary, n.”, in OED Online , Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, launched 2000.
- ^ “victimary, adj.”, in OED Online , Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, launched 2000.
Categories:
- English terms borrowed from Middle French
- English terms derived from Middle French
- English terms derived from Latin
- English lemmas
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- English countable nouns
- English terms with historical senses
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- English terms suffixed with -ary
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