Today's Word "Panacea"
Published in Vocabulary
panacea \pae-neh-SEE-eh\ (noun) - A remedy for everything, for all problems or difficulties; a cure-all, a catholicon.
"What's wrong with producing a 'panacea for all human woes' or 'the secret of human happiness?'" -- Will Ferguson, 'Happiness'
From Latin "panacea," a herb Romans believed could cure all diseases. The word was borrowed from Greek panakeia "universal cure," the feminine of the adjective panakeios "all-healing" from pan "all" + akos "cure." The Greek adjective pan "all" also appears in Pandaemonium, the all-demon city in the Hell of Milton's 'Paradise Lost.' It is productively used to create adjectives like "pan-Arab," "pan-African," "pan-American," whose abbreviation, "Panam" underlies the name of Panama. "Pan" can also be seen in panegyric "elaborate oration of praise" from Greek panegyris "public festival," originally based on pan- + agora "assembly" + -ikos "ic."
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