Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. The chief magistrate in any of the republics of medieval Italy.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. One of certain magistrates in Italy A foreign magistrate, placed by the emperor Frederick Barbarossa over various Italian cities.
- n. In many Italian cities, a subordinate municipal judge.
Wiktionary
- n. One of the chief magistrates of the Italian republics in the Middle Ages.
- n. A mayor, alderman, or other magistrate, in some towns of Italy.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. One of the chief magistrates of the Italian republics in the Middle Ages.
- n. A mayor, alderman, or other magistrate, in some towns of Italy.
Etymologies
- From Italian, from Latin potestas power, magistracy. See potent. (Wiktionary)
- Italian podestà, from Old Italian podestate, from Latin potestās, power, from potis, powerful, able; see poti- in Indo-European roots. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“D'Ucello might well discover that poison had killed Daoud; the podesta was a very clever and knowledgeable man.”
“Florence write and establish their final condemnation of noblesse living by rapine, those 'Ordinamenti della Giustizia,' which practically excluded all idle persons from government, and determined that the priors, or leaders of the State, should be priors, or leaders of its arts and productive labour; that its head 'podesta' or 'power' should be the standard-bearer of justice; and its council or parliament composed of charitable men, or good men: "boni viri," in the sense from which the French formed their noun 'bonte.”
“podesta" is more and more limited to a judicial function.”
“| Reply | Permalink you also have john podesta, former clinton chief of staff, running Obama's transition”
Ron Klain Will Be Biden's Chief Of Staff As Old Clinton Hands Return To D.C.
“An important attribute of the podesta was that he had to be a foreigner so that he could be neutral to the internal "discords and conspiracies" (Waley 1991, 37).”
“The podesta was usually hired for a year and played the role of military leader, judge, and administrator.”
“To overcome factional strife, most Italian communes adopted the institution of podesta, a foreigner endowed with judicial and administrative powers.”
“June 19th, 2006 at 1: 37 pm troll says: listening to podesta on radio.”
Think Progress » Moderate Bush Official Resigns, Feeling ‘Marginalized’ And ‘Subordinate’
“I put the Magazine in my coat-pocket, and left him and the podesta.”
“The pesatero or landlord of the inn had been despatched by my brave chapel-churies, with his fine family of children — the officers quartered in the podesta had of course bolted; but one man remained, and my fellows were on the point of cutting him into ten thousand pieces with their borachios, when I arrived in the room time enough to prevent the catastrophe.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘podesta’.
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Logolepsy
"Luciferous Logolepsy is a collection of over 9,000 obscure English words. Though the definition of an 'English' word might seem to be straightforward, it is not. There exist so many adopted, deriv...
Anschauung, Areopagus, Argus, Briarean, Dei gratia, Dei judicium, Deo volente, Duecento, Foehn, Geflugelte Worte, Gegenschein, Hakenkreuz and 9230 more...
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Phantom Islands
Errors of cartography.
frisland, sannikov land, hy-brasil, antillia, estotiland, pepys island, new south greenland, thompson island, bermeja, los jardines, ganges island, rica de oro and 33 more...
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A Long, Strange Trip
You'll definitely need a map. Inspired by Son of Groucho's comment on Islets of Langerhans.
slough of despond, pit of despair, den of iniquity, islets of langerhans, hippocampus, boulevard of brok..., canals of hering, hesselbach's tria..., crypts of lieberkühn, angle of louis, circle of willis, traube's space and 102 more...
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Verrines of Random Palavery
broth of a man, broth of a boy, saturege, satureja, selachophobia, misopogonistically, prosiopesis, excave, intermicate, meletian, cone-anchor, goose wing and 454 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for podesta.
Comments
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