# adamant
## English
### Alternative forms

* adamaunt (obsolete)

### Etymology

From Middle English adamant, adamaunt, from Latin adamantem, accusative singular form of adamās (“hard as steel”), from Ancient Greek ἀδάμας (adámas, “invincible”), from ἀ- (a-, “not”) + δαμάζω (damázō, “I tame”) or of Semitic origin. Doublet of diamond.

### Pronunciation

* IPA: /ˈæd.ə.mənt/, /ˈæd.ə.mænt/
* Audio (US):(file)
* Audio (New Jersey):(file)

### Adjective

adamant (comparative more adamant, superlative most adamant)
* (said of people and their conviction) Firm; unshakeable; unyielding; determined.
** 2002, Charles Moncrief, Wildcatters: The True Story of how Conspiracy, Greed and the IRS ..., page 195:Broiles and Kirkley were adamant about getting out of the lawsuit, but Mike and Dee were equally adamant about not wanting to sign a letter of apology
** 2006, Cara E. C. Vermaak, Confessions of the Dyslexic Virgin, page 275:Johan is determined to play the field and adamant about never committing.
** 2010, Deeanne Gist, Maid to Match, page 94:What good would such foolishness do a mountain man? But Pa had been adamant. Just as he'd been adamant about their reading, writing, numbers, geography, and languages. Just as he'd been adamant about using proper grammar
* (of an object) Very difficult to break, pierce, or cut.
** 1956, Arthur C. Clarke, The City and the Stars, page 34:Unprotected matter, however adamant, would have been ground to dust ages ago.

#### Synonyms

* See also Thesaurus:obstinate

#### Translations
### Noun

adamant (plural adamants)
* An imaginary rock or mineral of impenetrable hardness; a name given to the diamond and other substances of extreme hardness.
** 1582, Robert Parsons, chapter 8, in The first booke of the Christian exercise, appertayning to resolution‎, G. Flinton:This then is and alwayes hath ben the fashion of Worldlinges, & reprobate persons, to harden their hartes as an adamant stone, against anye thinge that shalbe tolde the for amendement of their lives, and for the savinge of their soules.
** 1611, King James Translators, Ezekiel 3:9:
    As an adamant harder than flint have I made thy forehead …
** 1831, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter XV, in Romance and Reality. […], volume I, London: Henry Colburn and Richard Bentley, […], →OCLC, page 162:But this was a finale she ever avoided: an offer, like the rock of adamant in Sinbad's voyages, finishes the attraction by destroying the vessel;...
* An embodiment of impregnable hardness.
** 1907, E.M. Forster, The Longest Journey, Part I, XV [Uniform ed., p. 163]:
    Actual life might seem to her so real that she could not detect the union of shadow and adamant that men call poetry.
* (archaic) A lodestone.
** c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “A Midsommer Nights Dreame”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, (please specify the act number in uppercase Roman numerals, and the scene number in lowercase Roman numerals):You draw me, you hard-hearted adamant: But yet you draw not iron, for all my heart Is true as steel. Leave you your power to draw, And I shall have no power to follow you.
* (obsolete or historical) A substance that neutralizes lodestones.
** 1657 [1608], Jean de Renou, translated by Richard Tomlinson, A Medicinal Dispensatory […], page 418:An Adamant hinders the attractive vertue, as also Garlick rubbed on the Magnet; for its attractive faculty is not so valid, but it may be easily deluded, obscured, and superated […]
** 2012, Daryn Lehoux, What Did the Romans Knows? An Inquiry into Science and Worldmaking, →ISBN, page 139:But we know from book 37 of the Natural History that adamant works on magnets in exactly the same way that garlic does: robbing them of their power to attract.

#### See also

* (imaginary desirably hard material): unobtainium

### Derived terms

* adamance (noun)
* adamantane (noun)
* adamantean (adjective)
* adamantine (adjective)
* adamantium (noun)
* adamantly (adverb)

### Further reading

* “adamant”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
* “adamant”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.

## Cornish
### Pronunciation

* IPA: /ˈadamant/

### Noun

adamant m (plural adamantow)
* The mineral, diamond
* A gemstone made from diamond.

## Irish
### Noun

adamant f (genitive singular adamainte, nominative plural adamaintí)
* Alternative form of adhmaint (“adamant, lodestone; magnet”)

#### Declension

bare forms
case
singular
plural
nominative
adamant
adamaintí
vocative
a adamant
a adamaintí
genitive
adamainte
adamaintí
dative
adamant
adamaintí
forms with the definite article
case
singular
plural
nominative
an adamant
na hadamaintí
genitive
na hadamainte
na n-adamaintí
dative
leis an adamant don adamant
leis na hadamaintí :

### Mutation

Note: Certain mutated forms of some words can never occur in standard Modern Irish. All possible mutated forms are displayed for convenience.

### Further reading

* Ó Dónaill, Niall (1977) “adamant”, in Foclóir Gaeilge–Béarla, Dublin: An Gúm, →ISBN

## Latin
### Verb

adamant
* third-person plural present active indicative of adamō

## Middle English
### Alternative forms

* adamaunde, adamaunt, adamawnte, ademand, athamaunt

### Etymology

Learned borrowing from Latin adamantem, accusative of adamās, from Ancient Greek ἀδάμας (adámas). Doublet of dyamaunt and adamas.

### Pronunciation

* IPA: /adəˈmant/, /adəˈmau̯nt/, /ˈadəmant/, /ˈadəmau̯nt/

### Noun

adamant (plural adamants)
* adamant, adamantine (valuable gemstone)
* An invulnerable or indomitable object
* A natural magnet; magnetite.

#### Related terms

* adamantine

#### Descendants

* English: adamant
* Scots: adamant (obsolete)

#### Further reading

* “adama(u)nt, n.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 2018-05-11.

## Old French
### Alternative forms

* adamante, adamaunt, aimand, aimande, aimant, äimant, aimante, aymant, aimaunt, aimont, aamant, amant, amand, aimas

### Etymology

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

### Noun

adamant oblique singular, ? (oblique plural adamanz or adamantz, nominative singular adamant, nominative plural adamanz or adamantz)
* adamant; diamond
* lodestone; magnet

### Further reading

adamant in Anglo-Norman Dictionary, Aberystwyth University, 2022

## Polish
### Alternative forms

* adamas, adament (Middle Polish)

### Etymology

Learned borrowing from Latin adamās, from Ancient Greek ἀδάμας (adámas, “invincible”). First attested in 1525. Doublet of diament.

### Pronunciation

* IPA: /aˈda.mant/
* (Middle Polish) IPA: /aˈda.mant/
* Rhymes: -amant
* Syllabification: a‧da‧mant

### Noun

adamant m inan
* adamant (an imaginary rock or mineral of impenetrable hardness; a name given to the diamond and other substances of extreme hardness)
** 2008, Zygmunt Kubiak, Mitologia Greków i Rzymian‎, Świat Książki:A pojawił się też opiekun wędrowców, Hermes, i wręczył młodzieńcowi sierp z adamantu.And the guardian of the wanderers, Hermes, also appeared and gave the young man a sickle made of adamant

#### Declension
### Noun

adamant m inan
* (Middle Polish, mineralogy) diamond
    Synonym: diament

#### Derived terms

* adamantowy

#### Related terms

* adamantynowy
* adamantan
* adamantyn

### References

* ↑ Krystyna Siekierska (08.03.2012) “ADAMANT”, in Elektroniczny Słownik Języka Polskiego XVII i XVIII Wieku [Electronic Dictionary of the Polish Language of the XVII and XVIII Century]
* ↑ Maria Renata Mayenowa, Stanisław Rospond, Witold Taszycki, Stefan Hrabec, Władysław Kuraszkiewicz (2010-2023) “adamas”, in Słownik Polszczyzny XVI Wieku [A Dictionary of 16th Century Polish]

### Further reading

* Krystyna Siekierska (08.03.2012) “ADAMAS”, in Elektroniczny Słownik Języka Polskiego XVII i XVIII Wieku [Electronic Dictionary of the Polish Language of the XVII and XVIII Century]
* J. Karłowicz, A. Kryński, W. Niedźwiedzki, editors (1900), “adamant”, in Słownik języka polskiego (in Polish), volume 1, Warsaw, page 7

## Romanian
### Etymology

Borrowed from Old Church Slavonic адамантъ (adamantŭ).

### Noun

adamant n (plural adamante)
* (dated) diamond
    Synonym: diamant