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Sep 9, 2021
This week’s theme
Eponyms

This week’s words
galahad
baedeker
zephyr
janus-faced
ritz

Janus
The Triumph of History over Time (detail), 1772
Art: Anton Raphael Mengs

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A.Word.A.Day
with Anu Garg

Janus-faced

PRONUNCIATION:
(JAY-nuhs-fayst)

MEANING:
adjective:
1. Looking in two different directions.
2. Having two contrasting aspects.
3. Hypocritical or deceitful.

ETYMOLOGY:
After Janus, the Roman god of doors, gates, and transitions. Earliest documented use: 1682. The month of January is named after Janus.

USAGE:
“Rabin was always a complex figure and his Janus-faced policies -- on the one hand the tough soldier who allegedly encouraged the army to ‘break bones’ during the first intifada and on the other hand the ‘man of peace’ -- loomed large in Israeli history.”
Seth J. Frantzman; Balancing Security and Necessity; Jerusalem Post (Israel); Mar 24, 2017.

See more usage examples of Janus-faced in Vocabulary.com’s dictionary.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:
If there existed no external means for dimming their consciences, one-half of the men would at once shoot themselves, because to live contrary to one's reason is a most intolerable state, and all men of our time are in such a state. -Leo Tolstoy, novelist and philosopher (9 Sep 1828-1910)

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