adoxograph

adox·og·raph
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UK/eɪˈdɒksɒˌɡɹɑːf/US/eɪˈdɑksɑˌɡɹæf/

noun

A work of adoxography.

Scrabble 24

Meanings

nounadoxograph (plural adoxographs)

plural adoxographs

  1. rhetoricA work of adoxography.

    Polycrates, disciple of Gorgias, wrote in praise of mice, pots, pebbles. Others of bees, salt, those are the Adoxographs. Dio Chrysostomos has a praise of mosquitoes, parrots, and hair. Lucian, praise of the fly.

    1989, Friedrich [Wilhelm] Nietzsche with Sander L. Gilman, Carole Blair, David J. Parent, editors & translators, Friedrich Nietzsche on Rhetoric and Language, New York, N.Y.: Oxford University Press, →ISBN
    1 more example

    [A]udiences laugh heartily because the adoxographs, if done with mock seriousness, are a broad form of irony, related to sarcasm. […] In the N-Town Passion Play I, Lucifer is an implied presenter of the play and an implied controller of its events. He addresses the audience directly and confidentially in an extraordinary 124-line adoxograph which is part social satire and part seriocomic plea for our commitment to his suzerainty […] The diabolical adoxographs that have been identified here are collectively an analogue of such cosmic symmetries as those in Dante [Alighieri] […]

    2005, John W. Velz, “Adoxography as Mode of Discourse for Satan and His Underlings in Medieval Plays”, in Clifford Davidson, editor, The Dramatic Tradition of the Middle Ages [AMS Studies in the Middle Ages; 26], New York, N.Y.: AMS Press, →ISBN, pages 98, 102 and 105

Origin

  1. Ancient Greekἄδοξος“obscure, ignoble”
  2. New Latinadoxus“absurd, paradoxical”
  3. Englishadoxograph

From New Latin adoxus (“absurd, paradoxical”) from Ancient Greek ἄδοξος (ádoxos, “obscure, ignoble”) (from ἀ- (a-, “not”) + δόξα (dóxa, “expectation”)) + -graph.

Full word history & related roots →
Cite this entry
APA

adoxograph. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/adoxograph

MLA

“adoxograph.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/adoxograph. Accessed November 3, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “adoxograph,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/adoxograph.

Source: adoxograph on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.