dictum
nounUK, US /ˈdɪk.təm/
Etymology From Latin dictum (“proverb, maxim”), from dictus (“having been said”), perfect passive participle of dico (“to say”). Compare Spanish dicho (“saying”). Doublet of dict.
1
An authoritative statement; a dogmatic saying; a maxim, an apothegm.
- This should not surprise us who know that van Gogh wrote: 'To paint and to love women is incompatible'; van Gogh was right for himself, which does not mean that he was right for everybody, and I will not draw from his dictum the probably incorrect conclusion that 'To paint and to love literature is incompatible.'1918, Walter Lionel George, A Novelist on Novels:
- […]a dictum which he had heard an economics professor once propound[…]1949, Bruce Kiskaddon, George R. Stewart, Earth Abides:
2 more examples
- 1. The utmost in steam producing capacity permitted by weight and dimensions; in other words, capacity to boil water—H. A. Ivatt's old dictum.1951 July, “British Standard Locomotives”, in Railway Magazine, page 438:
- But this is not the philosophical revolution of which I speak. What Warhol's dictum amounted to was that you cannot tell when something is a work of art just by looking at it, for there is no particular way that art has to look.1992, Arthur Coleman Danto, Beyond the Brillo Box, University of California Press, →ISBN, page 5:
2
A judicial opinion expressed by judges on points that do not necessarily arise in the case, and are not involved in it.
3
The report of a judgment made by one of the judges who has given it.
4
An arbitrament or award.
- Derived terms
- Aristotle's dictum, Judd's dictum, obiter dictum
- Related terms
- quidquid Latine dictum sit altum videtur, ipse dixit