Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
Definition: Tantalus |
TantalusNoun1. (Greek mythology) a wicked king and son of Zeus; condemned in Hades to stand in water that receded when he tried to drink and beneath fruit that receded when he reached for it. Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "Tantalus" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1374. (references) |
Etymology: Tantalus \Tan"ta*lus\, noun. [Latin expression, from the Greek expression Ta`ntalos.]. (references) |
| Domain | Definition |
19th Century Satire | A proud king, who suffered in Hades the agonies of hunger and thirst, with food and drink always in sight, but always beyond reach. Here on earth, the 50-cent table d'hote accomplishes the same result--besides costing you the fifty. Source: Foolish Dictionary, 1904. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
Tantalus in Greek mythology became a famous inhabitant of Tartarus, the portion of the Underworld reserved for the punishment of evildoers. He was the father of Pelops and Niobe.Tantalus was a son of Zeus and the nymph Plouto (not to be confused with the Roman name for Hades). Thus he was a king in the primordial world. He was associated with Phrygia or Lydia in Asia Minor. Like Lycaon, Tantalus tried to trick the Olympian gods back into their older identities by offering them a sacrifice-banquet of human flesh. Already blamed for having stolen the dog of Hephaestus (god of metals) (alternatively, he convinced his friend, Pandareus to do so), Tantalus killed his own son Pelops just to test the powers of the gods. He mutilated the dead body to make it unrecognisable, and served it as meat for the gods. The gods were aware of his plan, so they didn't touch the offering; only Demeter, disturbed by the rapture of her daughter Persephone, (or Dionysus) did not realise what it was and had a little of the baby's shoulder. Hermes, ordered by Zeus, brought the baby to life again (he collected the parts of the body and boiled them in milk) and rebuilt his shoulder in dolphin's ivory.
The kernel of myth embodied in this tale reinforces Olympian suppression of human sacrifice, which had apparently been offered in earlier times, especially to Demeter in her earlier embodiment as the Great Goddess, but which was now taboo.
Tantalus' punishment, now proverbial for endless efforts to achieve results, was to stand in a pool of water beneath a fruit tree with low branches. Whenever he reached for the fruit, the branches raised his intended meal from his grasp. Whenever Tantalus bent down to get a drink, the water receded before he could get any.
Tantalus is the origin of the English word "tantalize." The idea being that when a person tantalizes someone else, that person is making them like Tantalus: there is something desirable that is always just out of that person's reach.
A Tantalus, by an obvious analogy, is also the term for a type of drinks decanter stand in which the bottle stoppers are firmly clamped down by a locked metal bar, as a means of preventing servants from stealing the master's liquor.
Homer. Odyssey XI, 582-92; Apollodorus. Bibliotheke III, v, 6; Apollodorus. Epitome II,1-3; Ovid. Metamorphoses IV, 458-9; VI, 172- 76 & 403-11.
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Tantalus."
| Context | Synonyms within Context (source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus). |
Desire | Edge of appe edge of hunger; torment of Tantalus; sweet tooth, lickerish tooth; itching palm; longing eye, wistful eye, sheep's eye. |
Expectation | Suspense, waiting, abeyance; curiosity; anxious expectation, ardent expectation, eager expectation, breathless expectation, sanguine expectation; torment of Tantalus. |
| Source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus. | |
Crosswords: Tantalus |
| English words defined with "Tantalus": Niobe ♦ Pelican ibis ♦ Tantalism ♦ Wood ibis. (references) |
| Specialty definitions using "Tantalus": Covetous Man ♦ Patrick's Purgatory. (references) |
| Etymologies containing "Tantalus": tantalum. (references) |
| Non-English Usage: "Tantalus" is also a word in the following language with the English translation in parentheses. Dutch (Tantalus). |
| Domain | Title |
Books | |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Thumbnail | Description & Credit |  | Overlooking Honolulu at night from Tantalus Drive. Credit: America's Coastlines. |
Source: pictures compiled by the editor from various references; see picture credits. | |||
| "Tantalus" is generally used as a noun (singular) -- approximately 100.00% of the time. "Tantalus" is used about 7 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted) |
| Parts of Speech | Percent | Usage per 100 Million Words | Rank in English |
| Noun (singular) | 100% | 7 | 133,076 |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
Expressions using "Tantalus": Tantalus leucocephalus ♦ Tantalus loculator ♦ torment of Tantalus. Additional references. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. |
| The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com. |
| Expression | Frequency per Day |
tantalus | 48 |
tantalus lodge | 11 |
tantalus lodge whistler | 5 |
lodge resort tantalus | 3 |
crystal tantalus | 3 |
daughter tantalus | 3 |
picture tantalus | 2 |
ramble tantalus | 2 |
drive tantalus | 2 |
hawaii tantalus | 2 |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Language | Translations for "Tantalus"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | |
Albanian | tantall. (various references) | |
Arabic | تنتالوس ملك أسطوري, صندوق مقفل مشتمل على محتويات. (various references) | |
Bulgarian | ибис (ibis). (various references) | |
Dutch | Tantalus. (various references) | |
Esperanto | Tantalo. (various references) | |
French | Tantale (tantalum). (various references) | |
German | Tantalusqual (torments of Tantalus). (various references) | |
Greek | τάνταλοσ. (various references) | |
Hungarian | tantalusz. (various references) | |
Pig Latin | antalustay.(various references) | |
Portuguese | tântalo (tantalum). (various references) | |
Russian | тантал (tantalum). (various references) | |
Serbo-Croatian | tantal (tantalum). (various references) | |
Turkish | tantal (tantalum), kilitli içki şişesi. (various references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various translation references. | ||
Derivations | |
Words beginning with "Tantalus": tantaluses. (additional references) | |
| |
"Tantalus" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: Cantamus, Tanabu, tantalis, Tantallon, Tyndalls. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
| # of Phoneme Matches | Pronunciation | Word(s) rhyming with "Tantalus" (pronounced ta"ntulus) |
| 5 | -t u l u s | nautilus. |
| 4 | -u l u s | acropolis, anomalous, calculus, Carolus, fabulous, frivolous, garrulous, incredulous, libelous, marvelous, megalopolis, merciless, meticulous, metropolis, miraculous, nebulous, necropolis, Oxalis, pendulous, perilous, populace, populous, querulous, ridiculous, scandalous, scrupulous, scurrilous, stimulus, syphilis, tremulous, unscrupulous. |
| 3 | -l u s | accomplice, ageless, aimless, airless, Amaryllis, atlas, bacillus, backless, balas, baseless, blameless, bloodless, bolus, boneless, bottomless, boundless, brainless, breathless, callous, callus, careless, cashless, ceaseless, childless, classless, cloudless, clueless, Colas, colorless, cordless, countless, cutlass, defenseless, digitalis, directionless, doubtless, driverless, ductless, earless, effortless, endless, expressionless, eyeless, faceless, fatherless, fearless, featherless, featureless, feckless, fellas, fenceless, flawless, flightless, frictionless, fruitless, Gallus, gladiolus, godless, graceless, groundless, guileless, guiltless, hairless, hapless, harmless, headless, heartless, helpless, homeless, hopeless, hornless, humorless, irregardless, issueless, jealous, jobless, keyless, lactobacillus, landless, lawless, leaderless, leafless, legless, lifeless, limbless, limitless, listless, loveless, luckless, malice, meaningless, meatless, mindless, motherless, motionless, nameless, necklace, needless, odorless, overzealous, painless, palace, paperless, peerless, penniless, pilotless, pitiless, pointless, polis, powerless, priceless, prothallus, purposeless, reckless, regardless, relentless, remorseless, restless, riskless, rootless, rudderless, ruthless, scoreless, seamless, selfless, senseless, sexless, shameless, shapeless, shiftless, skinless, sleepless, sleeveless, smokeless, solace, soulless, speechless, spineless, spotless, stainless, stateless, stylus, surplus, tasteless, thankless, thoughtless, ticketless, tieless, timeless, tireless, toothless, topless, treeless, trellis, useless, valueless, victimless, voiceless, warrantless, weightless, windlass, windowless, wireless, witless, wordless, worthless, zealous, zipless. |
Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits. | ||
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
| Words within the letters "a-a-l-n-s-t-t-u" | |
-1 letter: saltant, sultana. | |
-2 letters: alants, aslant, lauans, statal, sultan, taunts. | |
-3 letters: alans, alant, anlas, antas, atlas, aunts, lauan, lunas, lunts, nasal, natal, sault, sauna, slant, stunt, sutta, talas, talus, taunt, tauts, tunas, ulans, ulnas. | |
-4 letters: aals, alan, alas, alts, anal, anas, ansa, anta, ants, anus, aunt, last, lats, luna, lunt, lust, nuts, salt, saul, slat. | |
| Words containing the letters "a-a-l-n-s-t-t-u" | |
+1 letter: sultanate, tantalums. | |
+2 letters: naturalist, salutation, sultanates, tantaluses, tarantulas. | |
+3 letters: adulterants, naturalists, salutations, situational, strangulate, substantial, tabulations. | |
+4 letters: adjustmental, agglutinates, auscultating, auscultation, blastulation, entablatures, gastrulating, gastrulation, gratulations, matriculants, naturalistic, salutational, salutatorian, strangulated, strangulates, substantials, substantival, transmutable, transnatural, transvaluate, triangulates, ultradistant, untranslated, utilitarians. | |
+5 letters: adulterations, antiritualism, antisexuality, articulations, astronautical, auscultations, blastulations, capitulations, congratulates, futilitarians, gastrulations, inarticulates, insubstantial, maladjustment, postulational, salutatorians, situationally, strangulating, strangulation, substantially, supplantation, transcultural, transvaluated, transvaluates, ultradistance, ultramontanes, unsubstantial. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro. | |
| 1. Definition 2. Crosswords 3. Usage: Commercial 4. Images: Slideshow | 5. Images: Photo Album 6. Usage Frequency 7. Expressions 8. Expressions: Internet | 9. Translations: Modern 10. Derivations 11. Rhymes 12. Anagrams | 13. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
