Rhodian
/ˈrəʊdɪən/noun
A native or inhabitant of Rhodes, an island in the Aegean Sea off the south-west coast of Turkey.
adjective
1Of or relating to the order of the Knights Hospitallers based on the island of Rhodes.
2Of, relating to, or inhabiting the island of Rhodes.
3 Rhodian law: a collection of Byzantine laws, probably compiled in the 7th or 8th centuries a.d., regulating life at sea.
- The laws included regulations for life on board ship, profit-sharing by crew members, and shared liability for the value of goods jettisoned, lost to pirates, or destroyed in shipwrecks..
4 Historical. Designating rhetoric or a rhetorical style characteristic of the ancient Rhodian school of oratory, regarded as being the middle way between the elaborate rhetoric of the Asiatic school and the restraint of the Attic.
- The idea that the Rhodian was a ‘middle style’ appears to originate with Quintilian (Institutio Oratoria xii. x.16–19 at 18). Cicero (in Brutus 51) claims only that the Rhodian was closer to Attic than was the Asiatic style..
5Designating a type of late Iznik ware pottery characterized by brilliant (especially red) pigments and an expanded colour range.
- Produced from the late 1550s until around 1600, this pottery was formerly thought to have originated on Rhodes. Iznik in north-western Turkey was formerly known as Nicaea..
Origin
Late Middle English; earliest use found in Boccaccio's De Claris Mulieribus. From classical Latin Rhodius (also Rodius) of or belonging to Rhodes, Rhodian, designating a rhetorical style, (noun) inhabitant of Rhodes (from ancient Greek Ῥόδιος of or from Rhodes from Ῥόδος (classical Latin Rhodos, Rhodus (also Rodos, Rodus)) the name of Rhodes, an island in the Aegean Sea off the coast of Lycia (in Asia Minor) with a capital of the same name + -ιος, suffix forming adjectives) + -an.