Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun Tragic flaw.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun The tragic flaw of the protagonist in a literary tragedy.
  • noun Christian theology : sin

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun the character flaw or error of a tragic hero that leads to his downfall

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Greek, from hamartanein, to miss the mark, err.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Ancient Greek ἁμαρτία (hamartia), meaning error or failure. From the verb ἁμαρτάνω hamartanō, "to miss the mark".

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Examples

  • It was for Alexander a tragic flaw, or hamartia, a Greek word meaning to miss the mark when shooting an arrow Christians would later use the same word to mean “sin”.

    Alexander the Great Philip Freeman 2011

  • It was for Alexander a tragic flaw, or hamartia, a Greek word meaning to miss the mark when shooting an arrow Christians would later use the same word to mean “sin”.

    Alexander the Great Philip Freeman 2011

  • It was for Alexander a tragic flaw, or hamartia, a Greek word meaning to miss the mark when shooting an arrow Christians would later use the same word to mean “sin”.

    Alexander the Great Philip Freeman 2011

  • Your hamartia is your: a. tragic flaw that leads to your downfall.

    Blogposts | guardian.co.uk Michael Tomasky 2010

  • Most common, however, is "hamartia," a term from archery meaning to "miss the mark" particularly by falling short.

    "Should I stay with my girlfriend after she gave up sex for religion?" Ann Althouse 2009

  • Yet in every Greek tragedy the catalyst for the protagonist’s downfall is hamartia, from the Greek hamartanein, a term that describes an archer missing the target.

    Amaryllis in Blueberry Christina Meldrum 2011

  • Yet in every Greek tragedy the catalyst for the protagonist’s downfall is hamartia, from the Greek hamartanein, a term that describes an archer missing the target.

    Amaryllis in Blueberry Christina Meldrum 2011

  • Yet in every Greek tragedy the catalyst for the protagonist’s downfall is hamartia, from the Greek hamartanein, a term that describes an archer missing the target.

    Amaryllis in Blueberry Christina Meldrum 2011

  • In essence, hamartia means “mistake,” pure and simple—although the mistake is never pure and rarely simple.

    Amaryllis in Blueberry Christina Meldrum 2011

  • In essence, hamartia means “mistake,” pure and simple—although the mistake is never pure and rarely simple.

    Amaryllis in Blueberry Christina Meldrum 2011

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