genius
pronunciation
How to pronounce genius in British English:
UK [ˈdʒiːniəs]
How to pronounce genius in American English:
US [ˈdʒiːniəs]
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- Noun:
- someone who has exceptional intellectual ability and originality
- unusual mental ability
- someone who is dazzlingly skilled in any field
- exceptional creative ability
- a natural talent
Word Origin
- genius
- genius: [16] Latin genius originally meant ‘deity of generation and birth’. It came ultimately from the Indo-European base *gen- ‘produce’ (source of English gene, generate, genitive, etc), probably via a derivative *gnjos. It broadened out considerably in meaning, initially to ‘attendant spirit’, the sense in which English originally acquired it (French took it over as génie, a word which, because of its phonetic and semantic similarity to Arabic jinn, 18th-century translators of the Arabian nights eagerly adopted into English as genie).The main modern English sense, ‘person of outstanding intellectual ability’, which dates from the 17th century, goes back to a comparatively rare Latin ‘intellectual capacity’. Genial [16] comes from Latin geniālis, a derivative of genius, which again originally meant ‘of generation and birth’ (a sense which survived into English: ‘And thou, glad Genius! in whose gentle hand the bridal bower and genial bed remain’, Edmund Spenser, Epithalamion 1595).It later developed in Latin to ‘pleasant, festive’.=> general
- genius (n.)
- late 14c., "tutelary or moral spirit" who guides and governs an individual through life, from Latin genius "guardian deity or spirit which watches over each person from birth; spirit, incarnation; wit, talent;" also "prophetic skill," originally "generative power" (or "inborn nature"), from PIE *gen(e)-yo-, from root *gene- "to produce, give birth, beget" (see genus). Sense of "characteristic disposition" of a person is from 1580s. Meaning "person of natural intelligence or talent" and that of "exalted natural mental ability" are first recorded 1640s.
Synonym
Antonym
Example
- 1. Such is the simple genius of japanese tv .
- 2. Boldness has genius , power and magic in it .
- 3. Vigilant eurosceptics are usually keen to see conniving genius in european federalists .
- 4. Han van meegeren was an artist who felt underappreciated and thought he could trick art experts into admitting his genius .
- 5. That is true genius of this nation .