| 释义 |
-cracy|-krəsɪ|
formerly also -cratie, -crasie, a. F. -cratie, ad. med.L. -cratia, a. Gr. -κρατία, in composition ‘power, rule’, f. κράτος strength, might, rule, authority. Already used in Greek in ἀριστοκρατία aristocracy, rule of the best-born, δηµοκρατία democracy, popular government, ὀχλοκρατία ochlocracy, mob-rule, πλουτοκρατία plutocracy, an oligarchy of wealth, θεοκρατία theocracy, rule of God; whence angelocracy, government by angels, bestiocracy (The Times 21 Nov. 1863) the rule of beasts. All these have a preceding o belonging to or representing the stem vowel of the first element, but which tends to be viewed as part of the suffix, as if this were -ocracy. The word aristocracy has in modern times, in Fr. and Eng., passed into the senses of ‘a ruling body of nobles, the nobles as a ruling class, political power, or upper class’, after which democracy has received the sense of ‘the people or lower class as a political power or element’, and plutocracy that of ‘a class ruling or influential by virtue of its wealth’.
Hence the suffix, in the form -ocracy, has been added to English words, to designate in mockery or ridicule any dominant, superior, or aspiring class, as in the following (mostly colloquial or newspaper words); barristerocracy, brokerocracy, capocracy, millocracy, shipocracy, shoddyocracy (barristers, brokers, cap-setting women, mill-owners, ship-owners, shoddy-manufacturers, as classes of social standing or pretensions); see also beerocracy, clubocracy, cottonocracy, countyocracy, mobocracy, snobocracy, shopocracy, slaveocracy, etc.
1866Lond. Rev. 6 Jan. 6/1 The Lord Lieutenant..holds a court for the barristerocracy of Dublin to wear periodical pumps in. 1860Lit. Churchman VI. 270/1 The ‘demoralising’ influence of a slipper-working ‘capocracy’ upon the minds..of the younger clergy. 188719th Centy. Aug. 159 Anarchy..is obviously as incompatible with plutocracy as with any other kind of cracy. |