Word of the Day - 06/11/26
chimera
/kɪ'mirə/(n.): (Greek mythology) fire-breathing female monster with a lion's head and a goat's body and a serpent's tail; daughter of Typhon
In Greek mythology, the hero Bellerophon, riding Pegasus, was fated to slay the formidable Chimera.
(n.): a strange, horrible, or impossible idea or figment of the imagination
"The modern masters promise very little; they know that metals cannot be transmuted, and that the elixir of life is a chimera." - Professor Waldman in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein
(n.): anything created by taking parts or aspects of different kinds of things and combining them
"What a Chimera is man! What a novelty, a monster, a chaos, a contradiction, a prodigy!" - Blaise Pascal
(n.): an individual, organ, or part consisting of tissues of diverse genetic constitution
Genetic testing revealed that the patient was a chimera, possessing blood cells and skin cells with different genetic constitutions due to the fusion of two embryos early in development.
Word Origin
The word 'chimera' originates from the Latin 'chimaera', which in turn comes from the Ancient Greek 'Khimaira' (Χίμαιρα). In Greek mythology, the Chimaira was a monstrous fire-breathing female creature, often depicted with the head of a lion, the body of a goat, and a serpent's tail. The word eventually evolved to describe any mythical monster with parts from various animals, and by the 17th century, it took on the figurative meaning of an absurd or impossible fancy; a wild or idle fancy.
Words with similar origins, in the sense of being direct borrowings from Greek mythological proper nouns that refer to specific creatures or figures, include 'hydra' (from the Lernaean Hydra, a multi-headed serpent), 'gorgon' (from the Gorgons, mythical monsters with venomous snakes for hair, like Medusa), and 'phoenix' (from the mythical bird that regenerates from ashes). These words, like 'chimera', entered English directly from the names of specific beings in Greek mythology.