relic
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /ˈɹɛlɪk/
Forms: form: relics
form: relick
form: relique
Etymology: From Middle English relik et al., from Old French relique, from Latin reliquiae (“remains, relics”), from relinquō (“I leave behind, abandon, relinquish”), from re- + linquō (“I leave, quit, forsake, depart from”). Doublet of relict, derelict, and relinquish.
Senses: examples: text: […] let him not ask our pardon;
The nature of his great offence is dead,
And deeper than oblivion we do bury
The incensing relics of it […]
ref: c. 1604–1605 (date written), William Shakespeare, “All’s Well, that Ends Well”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene iii]:
text: Though a Cup of cold water from ſome hand may not be without it's reward, yet ſtick not thou for Wine and Oyl for the Wounds of the Distreſſed, and treat the poor, as our Saviour did the Multitude, to the reliques of ſome baskets.
ref: c. 1670s (date written), Thomas Brown [i.e., Thomas Browne], “(please specify the section)”, in John Jeffery, editor, Christian Morals, […], Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: […] [A]t the University-Press, for Cornelius Crownfield printer to the University; and are to be sold by Mr. Knapton […]; and Mr. [John] Morphew […], published 1716, →OCLC, part I, page 5:
text: 1797, Ann Radcliffe, The Italian, London: T. Cadell Jun. & W. Davies, Volume 2, Chapter 6, p. 184,
It appeared, from […] the ruins scattered distantly along its skirts, to be a part of the city entirely abandoned by the modern inhabitants to the reliques of its former grandeur.
text: She exerted the last relics of her wasted strength to gain a prominent position upon a ledge of the rocks behind her […]
ref: 1850, Wilkie Collins, chapter 1, in Antonina, or, The Fall of Rome, volume I, London: Richard Bentley, pages 10–11:
text: [T]hey know that the low social level of the mass of the race is responsible for much discrimination against it, but they also know, and the nation knows, that relentless color-prejudice is more often a cause than a result of the Negro’s degradation; they seek the abatement of this relic of barbarism, and not its systematic encouragement and pampering by all agencies of social power from the Associated Press to the Church of Christ.
ref: 1903 April 18, W[illiam] E[dward] Burghardt Du Bois, “Of Mr. Booker T. Washington and Others”, in The Souls of Black Folk: Essays and Sketches, Chicago, Ill.: A[lexander] C[aldwell] McClurg & Co., →OCLC, page 53:
synonyms: word: remnant
word: remainder
word: residue
word: lave
word: leavings
word: leftover
word: ort
word: relic
word: remainder
word: remains
word: remanent
word: remnant
word: residue
word: residuum
word: rest
word: rump
glosses: That which remains; that which is left after loss or decay; a remaining portion.
examples: text: […] the imperfect light entering by their narrow casements showed bedsteads of a hundred years old; chests in oak or walnut, looking, with their strange carvings of palm branches and cherubs’ heads, like types of the Hebrew ark; rows of venerable chairs, high-backed and narrow; stools still more antiquated, on whose cushioned tops were yet apparent traces of half-effaced embroideries, wrought by fingers that for two generations had been coffin-dust. All these relics gave to the third storey of Thornfield Hall the aspect of a home of the past: a shrine of memory.
ref: 1847 October 16, Currer Bell [pseudonym; Charlotte Brontë], chapter XI, in Jane Eyre. An Autobiography. […], volume I, London: Smith, Elder, and Co., […], →OCLC, page 197:
text: Published in 1982, the now out-of-print computer guide is a real relic, full of dozens of black-and-white pictures of large, bulky computers that you would sooner find in the Smithsonian than on anybody's desk today.
ref: 1991, U.S. News & World Report, volume 116, numbers 9-16, page 72:
glosses: Something old and outdated, possibly kept for sentimental reasons.
examples: text: Why ſhould onely I,
Of all the other Princes of the World,
Be caſ’d-vp, like a holy Relique?
ref: 1612–1613 (date written), John Webster, The Tragedy of the Dutchesse of Malfy. […], London: […] Nicholas Okes, for Iohn Waterson, […], published 1623, →OCLC, Act III, scene ii:
text: No Anchorite in the exstasy of devotion, ever adored a relique with more fervour than that with which I kissed this inimitable proof of my charmer’s candour, generosity and affection!
ref: 1748, [Tobias Smollett], chapter 57, in The Adventures of Roderick Random. […], volume II, London: […] [William Strahan] for J[ohn] Osborn […], →OCLC, page 240:
text: […] the duke, in order to support their drooping hopes, ordered a procession to be made with the reliques of St. Valori, and prayers to be said for more favourable weather.
ref: 1762, David Hume, “[The Anglo-Saxons.] Chapter 3.”, in The History of England, from the Invasion of Julius Cæsar to the Accession of Henry VII, volume I, London: […] A[ndrew] Millar, […], →OCLC, page 135:
text: During that time he had been living with his youthful memory of her; but she had doubtless had other and more tangible companionship. Perhaps she too had kept her memory of him as something apart; but if she had, it must have been like a relic in a small dim chapel, where there was not time to pray every day....
ref: 1920, Edith Wharton, chapter 34, in The Age of Innocence, New York, N.Y.; London: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC:
topics: lifestyle
religion
synonyms: word: halidom
glosses: A part of the body of a saint, or an ancient religious object, kept for veneration.
examples: text: One of the primary targets of current and especially future cosmological observations are light thermal relics of the hot big bang.
ref: 2019, Wallisch, Benjamin, “Abstract”, in Cosmological Probes of Light Relics, page ix:
topics: astronomy
cosmology
natural-sciences
glosses: A particle or entity that has existed since the Big Bang.
Derived terms: Planck relic
Relic Sunday
Related terms: delict
delinquent
derelict
relict
relinquish
reliquary