diamantine

[Jonathan Lighter]

Maybe "brilliant" is what she had in mind.

JL

On Tue, Apr 10, 2012 at 11:30 PM, Sarah <puellaest at gmail.com> wrote:

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> Poster:       Sarah <puellaest at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: diamantine
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> I would wager it was being used in the sense of diamond, n. 3a (fig):
> Something very precious; a thing or person of great worth, or (in mod.
> use) a person of very brilliant attainments.
>
> 1st Pt. Returne fr. Parnassus iii. i. 1043,   I will bestowe upon them the
> precious stons of my witt, a diamonde of invention.
>
> And, skimming through some French examples from the same time, it seems
> likely that it was not so much "hard to make sense of" but unsurpassable.
> Like a diamond, nothing could beat it.
>
>
> On 2012-04-10, at 5:56 PM, Joel S. Berson wrote:
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> > Poster:       "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
> > Subject:      Re: diamantine
> >
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > At 4/10/2012 05:41 PM, Wilson Gray wrote:
> >
> >> On Tue, Apr 10, 2012 at 3:43 PM, Jonathan Lighter
> >> <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com> wrote:
> >>> most profound and diamantine verse
> >>
> >> Hard to make sense of?
> >
> > Wouldn't a speaker who knew how to use "diamantine" figuratively also
> > know to use "adamantine"?  (One of whose meanings is "impenetrable".)
> >
> > With respect to Jon's
> >> In any case, no figurative exx. in OED.
> >
> > the OED does admit "adamantine" has been used figuratively.  As
> > recently as 1996.  Perhaps it should give "diamantine" equal time.
> >
> > Joel
> >
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