Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun Tolerance or immunity to a poison acquired by taking gradually larger doses of it.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun Immunity against the action of a poison acquired by taking the drug in constantly increasing doses: a method said to have been conceived by Mithridates to protect himself against palace intrigues.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun The development of
immunity to apoison by gradual ingestion of successively greater amounts.
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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The old notion as to "mithridatism" was that an animal or a man would have to be separately prepared and
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I just ran into a nice word: mithridatism, named after Mithridates VI of Pontus, the phenomenon of partial immunity to poison acquired by taking small doses.
Arsenic Ray Girvan 2005
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It's hard not to think of Iocane powder; but arsenic is a classic real example of a poison where mithridatism is possible, as with the (possibly exaggerated) Arsenic Eaters of Styria, 19th century Austrian peasants who habitually ate, as a tonic, normally lethal doses of arsenic.
Arsenic Ray Girvan 2005
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This is the case of (relative) immunization or, as it is sometimes called, of mithridatism.
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One of my personal favorites in this category is mithridatism
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The question of whether proper names of people and places have a rightful place in a dictionary is probably an obsolete one: their presence was formerly justified on the grounds that as "words" they are far more frequent than many of the "legitimate" words, like elytron, greave, or mithridatism.
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As it is, one has to read through it to find the good stuff, which is not a thrilling prospect, notwithstanding the fact that much worthwhile material is here, though one should take it in small quantities: mithridatism The act of taking poison in increasing doses as a means of building an immunity to it, as in the case of people who start out with talk shows and gradually work their way up to situation comedies.
sionnach commented on the word mithridatism
building up a gradual immunity to poison by taking increasingly large doses over a long period. The approach works only for a quite restricted class of poisons, so don't try this at home.
February 16, 2007
slumry commented on the word mithridatism
Last stanza of "Terrence, this is Stupid Stuff" by A. E. Housman
There was a king reigned in the East:
There, when kings will sit to feast,
They get their fill before they think
With poisoned meat and poisoned drink.
He gathered all that sprang to birth
From the many-venomed earth;
First a little, thence to more,
He sampled all her killing store;
And easy, smiling, seasoned sound,
Sate the king when healths went round.
They put arsenic in his meat
And stared aghast to watch him eat;
They poured strychnine in his cup
And shook to see him drink it up:
They shook, they stared as white’s their shirt:
Them it was their poison hurt.
—I tell the tale that I heard told.
Mithridates, he died old.
July 26, 2007
reesetee commented on the word mithridatism
Ha! Where I first heard the word victuals. :-)
July 26, 2007
slumry commented on the word mithridatism
R, you inspire me to give this link to the full poem: http://poetry.poetryx.com/poems/5194
I often think of lines from the poem, especially
"Ale man, ale's the stuff to drink
For fellows whom it hurts to think."
Victuals is a classic case of a word that a reader would be likely to mispronounce!
July 26, 2007
reesetee commented on the word mithridatism
Thanks for the link, slumry! Nice to read a little poetry early in the morning. :-)
July 26, 2007
vendingmachine commented on the word mithridatism
Mithridatism is also used to treat peanut allergies but because of the high rate of adverse effects it is not recommended as a treatment.
An early trial of injecting escalating doses of peanut allergen was conducted in 1996. However, one participant died seconds after injection from laryngospasm due to a pharmacy error in calculating the dose. The death abruptly ended one of the only studies on injected allergen desensitization to peanut allergies.
June 23, 2015