ostracism

Learned borrowing from Ancient Greek ὀστρακισμός (ostrakismós, “banishment by means of voting with pot shards”), from ὀστρακίζω (ostrakízō, “ostracize”) + -ισμός (-ismós, “-ism”), from ὄστρακον (óstrakon, “clay pot”).

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈɒstɹəsɪz(ə)m/

ostracism (countable and uncountable, plural ostracisms)

1. (historical) In ancient Athens (and some other cities), the temporary banishment by popular vote of a citizen considered dangerous to the state. [from 16th c.]
   • 1579, Thomas North, Plutarch's Lives, volume 2, translation of original by Plutarch, published 1898, Themistocles, page 35:

     For this manner of banishment for a time, called ostracismos, was no punishment for any fault committed, but a mitigation and taking away of the envy of the people, which delighted to pluck down their stomacks that too much seemed to exceed in greatness: […]

   • 1588, Robert Greene, Perimedes the Blacke-smith. […], London: Printed by Iohn Wolfe, for Edward White, →OCLC; republished as J[ohn] Payne Collier, editor, Perimedes the Blacke-smith (Miscellaneous Tracts Temp. Eliz. & Jac. I), [London: s.n., 1867?], →OCLC, page 13:

     Take the ſweete herbe called pleaſant content; with that make a perfume about your bed chamber and where you dyne: the ſavour of this is as ſure a repulſe to exile melancholie, as the oſtracisme was to the noble of Athens.

   • 1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 32, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book II, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC:

     Witnesse the Ostracisme amongst the Athenians, and the Petalisme among the Siracusans.

2. (figuratively) Banishment by some general consent. [from 17th c.]
   • 1602–1603, Lady Arbella Stuart, edited by Sara Jayne Steen, The Letters of Lady Arbella Stuart, New York, N.Y.: Oxford University Press, published 1994, page 171:

     If I have deserved the land should spue me out, I will feed my selfe with the idle and windy conceite of an Ostracisme, and my unregarded poore selfe shall be all the richesse and commpany I crave to transport and if a Princes word […]

3. Temporary exclusion from a community or society.

• (exclusion): ostracization, shunning, petalism

• ostracize, ostracise

• send to Coventry

• Castroism, Croatisms, Socratism, microsats, rotacisms

Borrowed from French ostracisme.

ostracism n (uncountable)

1. ostracism

ostracism c

1. ostracism

• utfrysning

• ostracisera

• ostracism in Svenska Akademiens ordlista (SAOL)
• ostracism in Svensk ordbok (SO)
• ostracism in Svenska Akademiens ordbok (SAOB)