ancient

Word family

an·cient1 /ˈeɪnʃənt/ W2 adjectiveadj

1 OLD/NOT NEWbelonging to a time long ago in history, especially thousands of years ago 古代的 OPP modern

the ancient civilizations of Asia

亚洲的古代文明

ancient Greece/Egypt/Rome

the religion of ancient Egypt

古埃及宗教

2 LONG TIMEhaving existed for a very long time 古老的，年代久远的 OPP new

an ancient walled city

有城墙的古城

an ancient forest

一片古森林

the ancient art of calligraphy

古老的书法艺术

3 OLD/NOT YOUNGvery old – used humorously 老的，老掉牙的〔幽默用法〕

That photo makes me look ancient!

那张照片显得我很老！

► see thesaurus at old

4 ancient history

a) the history of ancient societies, such as Greece or Rome 古代史

a professor of ancient history

一位古代史教授

b) informal if you say that something is ancient history, you mean that it happened a long time ago and is not important now 很久以前的事，陈年往事〔指很久以前发生、现在已不重要的事〕

It’s all ancient history and I’m not upset anymore.

这都是陈年往事了，我不再生气了。

Examples from the Corpus

ancient history• For one thing, this is not ancient history.• He was so beautiful in those days - listen to me, those days, talking like it was all ancient history.• The world of Lowry's north seems to be ancient history.• Its very imperfection is powerful testimony of its ancient history, a history of step-by-step change rather than of deliberate design.• It has been fashionable in the last twenty years to suggest that there was in ancient history a utopian matriarchy.• Will and I broke up a long time ago - that's ancient history now.• That, too, seemed like ancient history now.• He was very fond of ancient histories, stories and epics of earlier times and heroes.• But my tale of ancient history was less than a generation old.

Examples from the Corpus

ancient• He's not just old, he's ancient.• Here are some recent piano releases for keyboards, solo and duo, ancient and modern.• Those assembled along the hill lines are keeping alive one of the world's most ancient and wide spread fertility rites.• The ancient Chinese believed that we are born with a finite amount of energy in our bodies called chi.• the pyramids of ancient Egypt• Doc drives an ancient Ford convertible.• an ancient Greek vase• Mum looks absolutely ancient in this picture.• This refrigerator is ancient -- it's time we bought a new one.• I prefer the more austere skeletons of the corals that live frugal, ancient lives in the deep sea.• This is a wonderful piece of ancient machinery of indeterminate age, and consists of a crank-driven triple piston pump.• Rome is famous for its ancient monuments.• Above the lip of the gorge he found traces of that ancient river bank.• The Samaritans have managed to keep only a few ancient texts.• The Great Forest is an ancient, vast and very varied woodland.• His conquests transformed the ancient world and ushered in the Hellenistic age of great monarchies.

ancient Greece/Egypt/Rome• Unquestionably it was ancient Rome's greatest legacy to the medieval world, greater probably even than its literature and its poetry.• From ancient Rome to the Weimar Republic to the Carter presidency, regimes have been rotted by the monetary cancer called inflation.• Fifteen metres below the surface of a man-made lake, the unknown treasures of ancient Rome will be abandoned for ever.

ancient2 noun

the ancients [plural]OLD/NOT NEW people who lived long ago, especially the Greeks and Romans 古人〔尤指古希腊人和古罗马人〕

The ancients believed that the Sun and Moon were planets.

古人认为太阳和月亮都是行星。

Examples from the Corpus

the ancients• The ancients believed that the sun and moon were planets.• There followed a very fierce dispute between the Ancients and the Moderns.• The best fuel of the ancients was wood.• A thorough knowledge of the ancients is thus a prerequisite of criticism.• Unlike Lactantius, Augustine did not treat the scientific scholarship of the ancients with ignorant contempt.• Among the Copernicans there was exhilaration at the thought that man, in his astronomical understanding, had now surpassed the ancients.• According to the ancients, seven planets circle the sun, hence the seven dwarfs.• It was a subject to which the Ancients had given much thought too.• However, other work focuses on why the ancients thought what they did.

Examples from the Corpus

ancient• To even the earliest Western visitors, the odd, boxy letters evoked the ancients.• Was she, he wondered, trying to make another fire in the fashion of the ancients?• The best fuel of the ancients was wood.• The comets that streaked the skies and scared the ancients were powered by Fenna's breath.• Among the Copernicans there was exhilaration at the thought that man, in his astronomical understanding, had now surpassed the ancients.• According to the ancients, seven planets circle the sun, hence the seven dwarfs.• The ancients staged mock battles to parallel the tempests in nature and reduce their fear of gods who warred across the sky.

Origin ancient1

(1300-1400) Old French ancien, from Vulgar Latin anteanus, from Latin ante “before”

an·cient1 adjectiveadjancient2 noun

Chinese

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