Ouroboros

Quick meaning: Ouroboros is a noun meaning (mythology) A serpent, dragon or worm that eats its own tail, a representation of the continuous cycle of life and death.

Meaning

(mythology) A serpent, dragon or worm that eats its own tail, a representation of the continuous cycle of life and death.

More Meanings

1. (by extension) Anything of a circular or recursive nature.

Example Sentences

The result is a statistical ouroboros: a self-reinforcing discrimination machine that amplifies social inequalities under the guise of technical neutrality.

Like an ouroboros, the story created and informed by the writer’s own experience suddenly flipped back on itself, Childress’s life now reflecting the story rather than the other way around.

The alchemists were fond of picturing their opus as a circulatory process, as a circular distillation or as the uroboros, the snake biting its own tail, and they made innumerable pictures of this process.

One myth speaks of Ouroboros, a serpent-like creature that survived and regenerated itself by eating only its own tail. By neither taking from nor adding to its environment, this creature was said to be completely environmentally benign and self-sufficient.

Word Forms

• ouroboroi
• ouroboroses

Related Words

Related dictionary entries include ogre, ophiomancy, ophite, python, cerastes, obeast.

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