behemoth
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /bəˈhi(ː).məθ/
ipa: /ˈbiː.əˌməθ/
Forms: form: behemoths
Etymology: From Middle English behemoth, bemoth, from Late Latin behemoth, from Hebrew בְּהֵמוֹת (behemót). Most likely, the Hebrew word is an intensive plural of בְּהֵמָה (behemá, “beast”), from Proto-Semitic (compare Ge'ez ብህመ (bəhmä, “to be dumb, to be speechless”), Arabic ب ه م (b h m)).
Some have instead suggested a borrowing from a hypothetical Egyptian pA-i-H-E1-mw (*pꜣ-jḥ-mw, “hippopotamus”, literally “the ox of the water”), from pꜣ (“definite article”) + jḥ (“ox, cattle”) + mw (“water”) in a direct genitive construction (for the pronunciation, compare the later Coptic descendants ⲡ- (p-) + ⲉϩⲉ (ehe) + ⲙⲟⲟⲩ (moou)); this, however, suffers from problems such as the lack of attestation of the supposed etymon, and there seems little reason to prefer it to the intensive plural explanation.
Senses: examples: text: ⸿ Beholde now Behemoth which I made with thee, hee eateth graſſe as an oxe.
 Loe now, his ſtrength is in his loynes, and his force is in the nauell of his belly.
 Hee moueth his taile like a Cedar: the ſinewes of his ſtones are wrapt together.
 His bones are as ſtrong pieces of braſſe: his bones are like barres of iron.
ref: 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Job 40:15–18, column 1:
topics: biblical
lifestyle
religion
coordinate_terms: leviathan
glosses: A great and mighty beast which God shows to Job in Job 40:15–24.
examples: text: Next she doused the smouldering troll with the contents of the restaurant's fire extinguisher, hoping the icy powder wouldn't revive the sleeping behemoth.
ref: 2001, Eoin Colfer, Artemis Fowl, page 58:
glosses: Any great and mighty monster.
examples: text: The diehards who did turn out were at least rewarded with a first sight of Jon Parkin, the behemoth striker signed from Preston, who scored a stunning goal on his debut at Norwich last weekend.
ref: 2011 January 18, Joe Lovejoy, “Cardiff City 0 Stoke City 2”, in Guardian Online:
text: The wide access corridors passed slowly, the conduits and pipes like the circulatory system of some vast planetary behemoth.
ref: 2012, James S. A. Corey, Gods of Risk, →ISBN:
text: We are the workers who built Alphabet. We write code, clean offices, serve food, drive buses, test self-driving cars and do everything needed to keep this behemoth running.
ref: 2021 January 4, Parul Koul, Chewy Shaw, “We Built Google. This Is Not the Company We Want to Work For.”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:
text: Hiei now loomed into the action, causing the leading U.S. destroyers to scatter before the oncoming behemoth lest they be run down.
ref: 2021 March 10, Drachinifel, 14:35 from the start, in Guadalcanal Campaign - The Big Night Battle: Night 1 (IJN 3(?) : 2 USN), archived from the original on 17 Oct 2022:
text: The phrase, “tank meta”, is one that carries a lot of weight when it comes to MOBAs. These metas are generally characterized by tanky, unkillable behemoths dominating the meta and leaving any character that isn’t focused around raw DPS in the dust.
ref: 2022 November 17, Carver Fisher, “League of Legends preseason 13 has made tanks unkillable”, in Dexerto:
text: And it's not just freight that arrives here. I notice several massive passenger liners, looking more like floating blocks of flats rather than the elegant ships from the days when 'POSH' was coined. The arrival of just one of these behemoths can swamp Southampton station with passengers and luggage, but not today.
ref: 2024 November 13, Paul Bigland, “Much to admire... but pockets of neglect”, in RAIL, number 1022, page 50:
synonyms: colossus
leviathan
mammoth
titan
glosses: Something which has the qualities of great power and might, and monstrous proportions.
Derived terms: behemothian
behemothic
Related terms: leviathan