47-626: Not to be confused with Toady . Toadie may refer to: Toadfish Rebecchi , a long-running character in the Australian soap opera, Neighbours In Australian usage, the smooth toadfish , common toadfish , and related fish species Toadwart , a cartoon character from Disney's Adventures of the Gummi Bears Toadies , an alternative rock band from Fort Worth, Texas See also [ edit ] Toad Frog and Toad Topics referred to by
94-495: A Boeotian purchases a sycophant as a typical Athenian product that he cannot obtain at home. A sycophant appears as a character in The Birds . One of his lost plays had, as its principal theme, an attack against a sycophant. In Wealth , the character, Sycophant, defends his role as a necessity in supporting the laws and preventing wrongdoing. In daily use, the term συκοφάντης refers to someone that purposely spreads lies about
141-710: A cultural artifact : the British Empire was at its maximum, imperialism was largely unchallenged, much of the world was still ruled by monarchs, and the tumultuous world wars were still in the future. They are a resource for topics omitted from modern encyclopaedias, particularly for biography and the history of science and technology. As a literary text, the encyclopaedia has value as an example of early 20th-century prose. For example, it employs literary devices , such as pathetic fallacy (attribution of human-like traits to impersonal forces or inanimate objects), which are not as common in modern reference texts. In 1917, using
188-533: A false accuser. Today, in Greek and French it retains the original meaning. The meaning in English has changed over time, however, and came to mean an insincere flatterer. The common thread in the older and current meanings is that the sycophant is in both instances portrayed as a kind of parasite, speaking falsely and insincerely in the accusation or the flattery for gain. The Greek plays often combined in one single character
235-493: A garden and steal figs, and that the law was so odious that informers were given the name sycophants. A different explanation of the origin of the term by Shadwell was that the sycophant refers to the manner in which figs are harvested, by shaking the tree and revealing the fruit hidden among the leaves. The sycophant, by making false accusations, makes the accused yield up their fruit. The Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition listed these and other explanations, including that
282-528: A handful of female contributors, with 34 women contributing articles to the edition. These included Adelaide Anderson , Gertrude Bell , Margaret Bryant , Constance Jocelyn Ffoulkes , Harriette Lombard Hennessy , and Eleanor Mildred Sidgwick . The eleventh edition introduced a number of changes of the format of the Britannica . It was the first to be published complete, instead of the previous method of volumes being released as they were ready. The print type
329-464: A key is given in each volume to these initials. Some articles were written by the best-known scholars of the time, such as Edmund Gosse , J. B. Bury , Algernon Charles Swinburne , John Muir , Peter Kropotkin , T. H. Huxley , James Hopwood Jeans and William Michael Rossetti . Among the then lesser-known contributors were some who would later become distinguished, such as Ernest Rutherford and Bertrand Russell . Many articles were carried over from
376-574: A more thorough update of the work was required. The fourteenth edition, published in 1929, was considerably revised, with much text eliminated or abridged to make room for new topics. Nevertheless, the eleventh edition was the basis of every later version of the Encyclopædia Britannica until the completely new fifteenth edition was published in 1974, using modern information presentation. The eleventh edition's articles are still of value and interest to modern readers and scholars, especially as
423-508: A person, in order to harm this person’s reputation, or otherwise insult his honor (i.e. a slanderer), and συκοφαντία is doing so (i.e. slander, n., to slander: συκοφαντώ ). In legal terms, Article 362 of the Greek Penal Code defines defamation ( δυσφήμηση ) "whoever who with in any way claims or spreads for someone else a fact that could harm that person's honor or reputation", whereas slanderous defamation ( συκοφαντική δυσφήμηση )
470-468: A reliable description of the academic consensus of its time, many modern readers find fault with the Encyclopedia for several major errors, ethnocentric and racist remarks, and other issues: The eleventh edition of Encyclopædia Britannica has become a commonly quoted source, both because of the reputation of the Britannica and because it is now in the public domain and has been made available on
517-431: A reliable source has been deemed problematic due to the outdated nature of some of its content. Modern scholars have deemed some articles as cultural artifacts of the 19th and early 20th centuries. Nevertheless, the 11th edition has retained considerable value as a time capsule of scientific and historical information, as well as scholarly attitudes of the era immediately preceding World War I . The 1911 eleventh edition
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#1733173885418564-418: A reprint of the eleventh edition, formed the twelfth edition of the work. A similar thirteenth edition, consisting of three volumes plus a reprint of the twelfth edition, was published in 1926. The London editor was J.L. Garvin , as Chisholm had died. The twelfth and thirteenth editions were closely related to the eleventh edition and shared much of the same content. However, it became increasingly apparent that
611-444: A witness, bribing ecclesiastical or civil authorities and juries, or other questionable things, with which one did not want to be personally associated. Sycophants were viewed as uncontrolled and parasitic, lacking proper regard for truth or for justice in a matter, using their education and skill to destroy opponents for profit in matters where they had no stake, lacking even the convictions of politicians, and having no sense of serving
658-537: Is a 29-volume reference work, an edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica . It was developed during the encyclopaedia's transition from a British to an American publication. Some of its articles were written by the best-known scholars of the time. This edition of the encyclopaedia, containing 40,000 entries, has entered the public domain and is readily available on the Internet. Its use in modern scholarship and as
705-425: Is different from Wikidata All article disambiguation pages All disambiguation pages Toady In modern English , sycophant denotes an "insincere flatterer" and is used to refer to someone practising sycophancy (i.e., insincere flattery to gain advantage). The word has its origin in the legal system of Classical Athens . Most legal cases of the time were brought by private litigants as there
752-448: Is that the opprobrium against sycophants was attached to the bringing of an unjustified complaint, hoping either to obtain the payment for a successful case, or to blackmail the defendant into paying a bribe to drop the case. Other scholars have suggested that the sycophant, rather than being disparaged for being motivated by profit, was instead viewed as a vexatious litigant who was over-eager to prosecute, and who had no personal stake in
799-429: Is when the fact is a lie, and the person who claims or spreads it knows that. The first case is punishable with up to two years' imprisonment or a fine, whereas slanderous defamation is punishable with at least three months' imprisonment and a fine. The word sycophant entered the English and French languages in the mid-16th century, and originally had the same meaning in English and French ( sycophante ) as in Greek,
846-712: The Enciclopedia Italiana and the Espasa as one of the three greatest encyclopaedias. It was the last edition to be produced almost in its entirety in Britain, and its position in time as a summary of the world's knowledge just before the outbreak of World War I is particularly valuable". Sir Kenneth Clark , in Another Part of the Wood (1974), wrote of the eleventh edition, "One leaps from one subject to another, fascinated as much by
893-429: The 9th edition , some with minimal updating. Some of the book-length articles were divided into smaller parts for easier reference, yet others were much abridged. The best-known authors generally contributed only a single article or part of an article. Most of the work was done by journalists, British Museum scholars and other scholars. The 1911 edition was the first edition of the encyclopaedia to include more than just
940-472: The Ancient Greek word συκοφάντης ( sykophántēs ) is a matter of debate, but disparages the unjustified accuser who has in some way perverted the legal system. The original etymology of the word ( sukon / sykos / συκος 'fig', and phainein / fanēs / φανης 'to show') "revealer of figs"—has been the subject of extensive scholarly speculation and conjecture. Plutarch appears to be
987-765: The Ku Klux Klan as protecting the white race and restoring order to the American South after the American Civil War , citing the need to "control the negro", and "the frequent occurrence of the crime of rape by negro men upon white women". Similarly, the "Civilization" article argues for eugenics , stating that it is irrational to "propagate low orders of intelligence, to feed the ranks of paupers, defectives and criminals ... which to-day constitute so threatening an obstacle to racial progress". The eleventh edition has no biography of Marie Curie , despite her winning
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#17331738854181034-603: The Nobel Prize in Physics in 1903 and the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1911, although she is mentioned briefly under the biography of her husband Pierre Curie . The Britannica employed a large female editorial staff that wrote hundreds of articles for which they were not given credit. The 1911 edition is no longer restricted by copyright , and it is therefore freely available in several more modern forms. While it may once have been
1081-442: The 11th edition for having bourgeois and old-fashioned opinions on art, literature, and social sciences. A contemporary Cornell professor, Edward B. Titchener , wrote in 1912, "the new Britannica does not reproduce the psychological atmosphere of its day and generation... Despite the halo of authority, and despite the scrutiny of the staff, the great bulk of the secondary articles in general psychology ... are not adapted to
1128-585: The Greek informer, and the current sense of a "flattering parasite", with both being cast as enemies—not only of those they wrong, but also of the person or state that they ostensibly serve. Sycophancy is insincere flattery given to gain advantage from a superior. A user of sycophancy is referred to as a sycophant or a “yes-man.” Alternative phrases are often used such as: [REDACTED] The dictionary definition of sycophancy at Wiktionary Encyclop%C3%A6dia Britannica Eleventh Edition The Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition (1910–1911)
1175-583: The Internet. It has been used as a source by many modern projects, including Misplaced Pages and the Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia . The Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia is the eleventh edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica , renamed to address Britannica's trademark concerns. Project Gutenberg 's offerings are summarized below in the External links section and include text and graphics. As of 2018 , Distributed Proofreaders are working on producing
1222-412: The content of the encyclopaedia was distributed as follows: Hooper sold the rights to Sears, Roebuck and Company of Chicago in 1920, completing the Britannica ' s transition to becoming a substantially American publication. In 1922, an additional three volumes (also edited by Hugh Chisholm) where published, covering the events of the intervening years, including World War I . These, together with
1269-399: The efforts made to make it more popular. American marketing methods also assisted sales. Some 14% of the contributors (214 of 1507) were from North America, and a New York office was established to coordinate their work. The initials of the encyclopaedia's contributors appear at the end of selected articles or at the end of a section in the case of longer articles, such as that on China, and
1316-442: The elements of the parasite and the sycophant, and the natural similarities of the two closely related types led to the shift in the meaning of the word. The sycophant in both meanings can also be viewed as two sides of the same coin: the same person currying one's favor by insincere flattery is also spreading false tales and accusations behind one's back. In Renaissance English, the word was used in both senses and meanings, that of
1363-501: The eleventh and fourteenth editions in their entirety, said he found the fourteenth edition to be a "big improvement" over the eleventh, stating that "most of the material had been completely rewritten". Robert Collison , in Encyclopaedias: Their History Throughout The Ages (1966), wrote of the eleventh edition that it "was probably the finest edition of the Britannica ever issued, and it ranks with
1410-410: The first to have suggested that the source of the term was in laws forbidding the exportation of figs, and that those who leveled the accusation against another of illegally exporting figs were therefore called sycophants. Athenaeus provided a similar explanation. Blackstone's Commentaries repeats this story, but adds an additional take—that there were laws making it a capital offense to break into
1457-421: The lack of personal involvement appears to have been the crux of the accusation of sycophancy against them, the merits of the cases being separate matters from whether they had a right to bring them. Efforts were made to discourage or suppress sycophants, including imposing fines on litigants who failed to obtain at least one fifth of the jury's votes, or for abandoning a case after it had begun (as would occur if
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1504-404: The making of false accusations was an insult to the accused in the nature of " showing the fig ", an "obscene gesture of phallic significance" or, alternatively that the false charges were often so insubstantial as to not amount to the worth of a fig. Generally, scholars have dismissed these explanations as inventions, long after the original meaning had been lost. Danielle Allen suggests that
1551-454: The play of mind and the idiosyncrasies of their authors as by the facts and dates. It must be the last encyclopaedia in the tradition of Diderot which assumes that information can be made memorable only when it is slightly coloured by prejudice. When T. S. Eliot wrote 'Soul curled up on the window seat reading the Encyclopædia Britannica ,' he was certainly thinking of the eleventh edition." (Clark refers to Eliot's 1929 poem " Animula ".) It
1598-622: The pseudonym of S. S. Van Dine, the US art critic and author Willard Huntington Wright published Misinforming a Nation , a 200+ page criticism of inaccuracies and biases of the Encyclopædia Britannica eleventh edition. Wright claimed that Britannica was "characterized by misstatements, inexcusable omissions, rabid and patriotic prejudices, personal animosities, blatant errors of fact, scholastic ignorance, gross neglect of non-British culture, an astounding egotism, and an undisguised contempt for American progress". Amos Urban Shirk , known for having read
1645-486: The public good. The charge of sycophancy against a litigant was a serious matter, and the authors of two surviving oratories, "Against the Grain Dealers" (author Lysias ) and "Against Leocrates" (author Lycurgus ), defend themselves against charges that they are sycophants because they are prosecuting cases as private citizens in circumstances where they have no personal stake in the underlying dispute. In each instance,
1692-414: The requirements of the intelligent reader". In an April 2012 article, Nate Pederson of The Guardian said that the eleventh edition represented "a peak of colonial optimism before the slaughter of war" and that the edition "has acquired an almost mythic reputation among collectors". Critics have charged several editions with racism, sexism , and antisemitism . The eleventh edition characterises
1739-409: The same term [REDACTED] This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the title Toadie . If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article. Retrieved from " https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Toadie&oldid=1051300468 " Category : Disambiguation pages Hidden categories: Short description
1786-431: The sycophant was bribed to drop the matter), and authorizing the prosecution of men for being sycophants. Statutes of Limitation were specifically adopted to try to prevent sycophancy. Sycophants are better illustrated through the satires of Aristophanes . In The Acharnians , a Megarian attempting to sell his daughters is confronted by a sycophant who accuses him of illegally attempting to sell foreign goods; and
1833-471: The tenth edition, which was published in 1902. Hooper's association with The Times ceased in 1909, and he negotiated with the Cambridge University Press to publish the 29-volume eleventh edition. Though it is generally perceived as a quintessentially British work, the eleventh edition had substantial American influences, in not only the increased amount of American and Canadian content, but also
1880-436: The term was "slightly obscene", connoting a kind of perversion, and may have had a web of meanings derived from the symbolism of figs in ancient Greek culture, ranging from the improper display of one's "figs" by being overly aggressive in pursuing a prosecution, the unseemly revealing of the private matters of those accused of wrongdoing, to the inappropriate timing of harvesting figs when they are unripe. The traditional view
1927-401: The underlying dispute, but brings up old charges unrelated to himself long after the event. Sycophants included those who profited from using their position as citizens for profit. For instance, one could hire a sycophant to bring a charge against one's enemies, or to take a wide variety of actions of an official nature with the authorities, including introducing decrees, acting as an advocate or
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1974-499: Was no police force and only a limited number of officially appointed public prosecutors . By the fifth century BC this practice had given rise to abuse by "sycophants": litigants who brought unjustified prosecutions. The word retains the same meaning ('slanderer') in Modern Greek , French (where it also can mean 'informer'), and Italian. In modern English, the meaning of the word has shifted to its present usage. The origin of
2021-469: Was also the first edition of Britannica to include biographies of living people. Sixteen maps of the famous 9th edition of Stielers Handatlas were exclusively translated to English, converted to imperial units , printed in Gotha , Germany, by Justus Perthes and the maps became a part of this edition. Later editions only included Perthes' maps as low-quality reproductions. According to Coleman and Simmons,
2068-476: Was assembled with the management of American publisher Horace Everett Hooper . Hugh Chisholm , who had edited the previous edition, was appointed editor-in-chief, with Walter Alison Phillips as his principal assistant editor. Originally, Hooper bought the rights to the 25-volume 9th edition and persuaded the British newspaper The Times to issue its reprint, with eleven additional volumes (35 volumes total) as
2115-626: Was censored under pressure from the Roman Catholic Church after the 11th edition. Initially, the eleventh edition received criticism from members of the Roman Catholic Church, who accused it of misrepresenting and being biased against Catholics . The most "vociferous" American Catholic critics of the eleventh edition were editors of the Christian magazine America . Authorities ranging from Virginia Woolf to professors criticised
2162-455: Was kept in galley proofs and subject to continual updating until publication. It was the first edition of Britannica to be issued with a comprehensive index volume in which was added a categorical index, where like topics were listed. It was the first not to include long treatise-length articles. Even though the overall length of the work was about the same as that of its predecessor, the number of articles had increased from 17,000 to 40,000. It
2209-560: Was one of Jorge Luis Borges 's favourite works, and was a source of information and enjoyment for his entire working life. In 1912, mathematician L. C. Karpinski criticised the eleventh edition for inaccuracies in articles on the history of mathematics , none of which had been written by specialists. English writer and former priest Joseph McCabe claimed in Lies and Fallacies of the Encyclopædia Britannica (1947) that Britannica
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