archon - Wiktionary, the free dictionary (original) (raw)

From Ancient Greek ἄρχων (árkhōn), a noun use of the present participle of ἄρχω (árkhō, “to rule”).

archon (plural archontes or archons)

  1. A chief magistrate of ancient Athens.
    • 1980, Burgess, Earthly Powers:
      Hated by the archons of Athens for his fearless condemnation of municipal graft, he was hypocritically arraigned on a charge of corrupting Athenian youth.
  2. A person who claims the right to rule, or to exercise power or sovereign authority over other human beings.
  3. A ruler, head of state or other leader.
    • 1922, James Joyce, Ulysses:
      But neither the midwife’s lore nor the caudlectures saved him from the archons of Sinn Fein and their noggin of hemlock.
  4. (Gnosticism) A supernatural being subordinate to the Demiurge.
    • 1981, William Irwin Thompson, The Time Falling Bodies Take to Light: Mythology, Sexuality and the Origins of Culture, London: Rider/Hutchinson & Co., page 83:
      Their claim to totality is like the cry of the archon Ialdabaoth that he was the Lord of the Universe and that there was nothing beyond him.

chief magistrate

archon

  1. H-system spelling of arĉon

From Ancient Greek ἄρχων (árkhōn).

archōn m (genitive archontis); third declension

  1. archon

Third-declension noun.