8 results for: platonic

Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1) - Cite This Source - Share This

Pla·ton·ic

Audio Help [pluh-ton-ik, pley-] Pronunciation Key

–adjective

1.	of, pertaining to, or characteristic of Plato or his doctrines: the Platonic philosophy of ideal forms.

2.	pertaining to, involving, or characterized by Platonic love as a striving toward love of spiritual or ideal beauty.

3.	(usually lowercase) purely spiritual; free from sensual desire, esp. in a relationship between two persons of the opposite sex.

4.	(usually lowercase) feeling or professing platonic love: He insisted that he was completely platonic in his admiration.

[Origin: 1525–35; < L Platōnicus < Gk Platōnikós, equiv. to Platōn-, s. of Plátōn Plato + -ikos, -ic

]

—Related forms

Pla·ton·i·cal·ly, adverb

Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1)
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006.

Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
platonic

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American Heritage Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This

Pla·ton·ic Audio Help (plə-tŏn'ĭk, plā-) Pronunciation Key
adj.

Of, relating to, or characteristic of Plato or his philosophy: Platonic dialogues; Platonic ontology.
often platonic Transcending physical desire and tending toward the purely spiritual or ideal: platonic love.
often platonic Speculative or theoretical.

[After Plato.]

Pla·ton'i·cal·ly adv.

Word History: Plato did not invent the term or the concept that bears his name, but he did see sexual desire as the germ for higher loves. Marsilio Ficino, a Renaissance follower of Plato, used the terms amor socraticus and amor platonicus interchangeably for a love between two humans that was preparatory for the love of God. From Ficino's usage, Platonic (already present in English as an adjective to describe what related to Plato and first recorded in 1533) came to be used for a spiritual love between persons of opposite sexes. In our own century Platonic has been used of relationships between members of the same sex. Though the concept is an elevated one, the term has perhaps more often been applied in ways that led Samuel Richardson to have one of his characters in Pamela say, "I am convinced, and always was, that Platonic love is Platonic nonsense."

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Online Etymology Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This
Platonic

1533, "of or pertaining to Gk. philosopher Plato" (429 B.C.E.-c.347 B.C.E.). The name is Gk. Platon, properly "broad-shouldered" (from platys "broad;" see place (n.)). His original name was Aristocles. The meaning "love (for one of the opposite sex) free of sensual desire" (1631), which the word usually carries nowadays, is a Renaissance notion; it is based on Plato's writings in "Symposium" about the kind of interest Socrates took in young men, which originally had no reference to women.

WordNet - Cite This Source - Share This

platonic
adjective
1.	of or relating to or characteristic of Plato or his philosophy; "Platonic dialogues"
2.	free from physical desire; "platonic love"

Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This

Platonic

Pla*ton"ic\, Platonical \Pla*ton"ic*al\, a. [L. Platonicus, Gr. ?: cf. F. platonique.]

1. Of or pertaining to Plato, or his philosophy, school, or opinions.

2. Pure, passionless; nonsexual; philosophical.

Platonic bodies, the five regular geometrical solids; namely, the tetrahedron, hexahedron or cube, octahedron, dodecahedron, and icosahedron.

Platonic love, a pure, spiritual affection, subsisting between persons of opposite sex, unmixed with carnal desires, and regarding the mind only and its excellences; -- a species of love for which Plato was a warm advocate.

Platonic year (Astron.), a period of time determined by the revolution of the equinoxes, or the space of time in which the stars and constellations return to their former places in respect to the equinoxes; -- called also great year. This revolution, which is caused by the precession of the equinoxes, is accomplished in about 26,000 years. --Barlow.

Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This

Platonic

Pla*ton"ic\, n. A follower of Plato; a Platonist.

Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This

Platonic

Year\, n. [OE. yer, yeer, [yogh]er, AS. ge['a]r; akin to OFries. i?r, g?r, D. jaar, OHG. j[=a]r, G. jahr, Icel. [=a]r, Dan. aar, Sw. [*a]r, Goth. j?r, Gr. ? a season of the year, springtime, a part of the day, an hour, ? a year, Zend y[=a]re year. [root]4, 279. Cf. Hour, Yore.]

1. The time of the apparent revolution of the sun trough the ecliptic; the period occupied by the earth in making its revolution around the sun, called the astronomical year; also, a period more or less nearly agreeing with this, adopted by various nations as a measure of time, and called the civil year; as, the common lunar year of 354 days, still in use among the Mohammedans; the year of 360 days, etc. In common usage, the year consists of 365 days, and every fourth year (called bissextile, or leap year) of 366 days, a day being added to February on that year, on account of the excess above 365 days (see Bissextile).

Of twenty year of age he was, I guess. --Chaucer.

Note: The civil, or legal, year, in England, formerly commenced on the 25th of March. This practice continued throughout the British dominions till the year 1752.

2. The time in which any planet completes a revolution about the sun; as, the year of Jupiter or of Saturn.

3. pl. Age, or old age; as, a man in years. --Shak.

Anomalistic year, the time of the earth's revolution from perihelion to perihelion again, which is 365 days, 6 hours, 13 minutes, and 48 seconds.

A year's mind (Eccl.), a commemoration of a deceased person, as by a Mass, a year after his death. Cf. A month's mind, under Month.

Bissextile year. See Bissextile.

Canicular year. See under Canicular.

Civil year, the year adopted by any nation for the computation of time.

Common lunar year, the period of 12 lunar months, or 354 days.

Common year, each year of 365 days, as distinguished from leap year.

Embolismic year, or Intercalary lunar year, the period of 13 lunar months, or 384 days.

Fiscal year (Com.), the year by which accounts are reckoned, or the year between one annual time of settlement, or balancing of accounts, and another.

Great year. See Platonic year, under Platonic.

Gregorian year, Julian year. See under Gregorian, and Julian.

Leap year. See Leap year, in the Vocabulary.

Lunar astronomical year, the period of 12 lunar synodical months, or 354 days, 8 hours, 48 minutes, 36 seconds.

Lunisolar year. See under Lunisolar.

Periodical year. See Anomalistic year, above.

Platonic year, Sabbatical year. See under Platonic, and Sabbatical.

Sidereal year, the time in which the sun, departing from any fixed star, returns to the same. This is 365 days, 6 hours, 9 minutes, and 9.3 seconds.

Tropical year. See under Tropical.

Year and a day (O. Eng. Law), a time to be allowed for an act or an event, in order that an entire year might be secured beyond all question. --Abbott.

Year of grace, any year of the Christian era; Anno Domini; A. D. or a. d.

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