Meaning of Xanthippe | Babel Free

Definitions

An ill-tempered woman.

dated, derogatory, literary

Equivalents

Examples

“Be ſhe as foule as was Florentius Loue, / As old as Sibell, and as curſt and ſhrow'd / As Socrates Zentippe, or a worſe: / She moues me not, or not remoues at leaſt / Affections edge in me.”

“RICHARD HOOKER, that rare and admirable Theologiſt, [...] married a clowniſh ſilly Woman and withal a meer Xantippe, [...]”

“[page 235] He was prudent and induſtrious, and ſo good a Huſbandman, that he might have led a very eaſy and comfortable Life, had not an errant Vixen of a Wife ſoured his domeſtic Quiet. [...] [page 236] By this Xantippe (ſo was the Wife of Socrates called, ſaid Partridge) By this Xantippe he had two Sons, of which I was the younger.”

“Who has not seen the cross looks and peevish temper of the teacher and parent copied, as by a mirror (though we should say without reflection), in the face and disposition of the child? [...] From an unbroken course of such treatment, who would expect any thing but an unbroken line of Nabals and Xanthippes?”

“What have we seen in our own personal walks through life to make us believe that women are devils? There may possibly have been a Xantippe here and there, but Imogenes are to be found under every bush.”

“The use he [Socrates] made of his domestic trial may be profitably remembered by any that have a Xanthippe to deal with.”

“The 'kneeling punishment' (罰跪) would seem to be a well recognized mode of enforcing their authority, in use by Chinese Xanthippes, for the proverb says: 'The Henpecked man is obliged to kneel with a lamp on his head [to make it certain that he does not stir] until the morning watch.'”

CEFR level