sileni

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium. Particularly: “probably derived from Latin, ? from Greek; see Silenus and Σειληνός”)

sileni pl (plural only)

1. (Greek mythology) A group of minor deities or demigods similar to fauns or satyrs.
   • 1968, Joseph Campbell, The Hero with a Thousand Faces, 2nd edition, London: Fontana Press, published 1993, page 12:

     And so, while husbands are worshiping at their boyhood shrines, being the lawyers, merchants, or masterminds their parents wanted them to be, their wives, even after fourteen years of marriage and two fine children produced and raised, are still on the search for love - which can come to them only from the centaurs, sileni, satyrs, and other concupiscent incubi of the rout of Pan, either as in the second of the above-recited dreams, or as in our popular, vanilla-frosted temples of the venereal goddess, under the make-up of the latest heroes of the screen.

• IPA^(key): /siˈleni/

sileni

1. plural of sileno