different between telic vs relic

English

Etymology

From the Ancient Greek ??????? (telikós, “final”), from ????? (télos, “end”).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?ti?l?k/

Adjective

telic (comparative more telic, superlative most telic)

1. Tending or directed towards a goal or specific end.
   • 2001, Michael Argyle, The Psychology of Happiness, 2nd Edition, page 129,

     They were asked to rate the 36 activities for how purposeful they were. […] Comparing the 10 most telic and the 10 most paratelic we found that the paratelic leisure activities were thought to involve less skill or challenge; they were also judged to satisfy social needs more, and to be more enjoyable.
2. (grammar) That expresses an end or purpose.
   • 1995, Michela Cennamo, Patterns of 'Active' Syntax in Late Latin Pleonastic Reflexives, John Charles Smith, Delia Bentley (editors), Historical Linguistics 1995: Selected Papers from the 12th International Conference on Historical Linguistics, Volume 1: General Issues and Non-Germanic Languages, page 39,

     In this framework, verbs denoting directed change of location, such as Italian andare 'go', instantiate Core Unaccusativity, in that they have a Theme subject and are the most telic, concrete, dynamic.

   • 2000, Niko Besnier, Tuvaluan: A Polynesian Language of the Central Pacific, 2002, page 495,

     Similarly, verb forms that can govern either transitive or middle-case marking (cf. 2.1.3.1.2(c)) are more telic in their transitive manifestations.

   • 2015, Pierre-Don Giancarli, Auxiliary selection with intransitive and reflexive verbs: the limits of gradience and scalarity, followed by a proposal, Rolf Kailuweit, Malte Rosemeyer (editors), Auxiliary Selection Revisited: Gradience and Gradualness, page 82,

     Moreover, let us remember that some verbs can be telic and agentive at the same time: if one looks at the ASH category n°1 (change of location), i.e. the verbs considered the most telic, like FF arriver (arrive), partir (leave), venir (come), revenir (come back) (Sorace 2000:256), old Spanish huir (run away) and escapar (escape) (Legendre 2007), do they not bear an agentive component?

3. (linguistics) That expresses the perfective aspect.

Antonyms

• (directed towards a specific end): paratelic
• (grammar: expressing an end or purpose): atelic

Derived terms

• paratelic
• telic aspect

Related terms

• telicity

See also

• teleo-
• teleology

References

• “telic, a.” listed in the Oxford English Dictionary [2^nd Ed.; 1989]

Anagrams

• cleit

English

Alternative forms

• relick (archaic)
• relique (archaic)

Etymology

From Middle English relik et al., from Old French relique, from Latin reliquiae (“remains, relics”), from relinqu? (“I leave behind, abandon, relinquish”), from re- + linqu? (“I leave, quit, forsake, depart from”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /???l?k/

Noun

relic (plural relics)

1. That which remains; that which is left after loss or decay; a remaining portion.
   • c. 1602, William Shakespeare, All’s Well That Ends Well, Act V, Scene 3,^[1]

     […] let him not ask our pardon;

     The nature of his great offence is dead,

     And deeper than oblivion we do bury

     The incensing relics of it […]

   • 1716, Thomas Browne, Christian Morals, 2nd edition edited by Samuel Johnson, London: J. Payne, 1756, Part I, p. 12,^[2]

     Though a cup of cold water from some hand may not be without its reward, yet stick not thou for wine and oil for the wounds of the distressed; and treat the poor, as our SAVIOUR did the multitude, to the reliques of some baskets.

   • 1797, Ann Radcliffe, The Italian, London: T. Cadell Jun. & W. Davies, Volume 2, Chapter 6, p. 184,^[3]

     It appeared, from […] the ruins scattered distantly along its skirts, to be a part of the city entirely abandoned by the modern inhabitants to the reliques of its former grandeur.

   • 1850, Wilkie Collins, Antonina, or, The Fall of Rome, London: Richard Bentley, Volume I, Chapter 1, pp. 10-11,^[4]

     She exerted the last relics of her wasted strength to gain a prominent position upon a ledge of the rocks behind her […]

   • 1903, W. E. B. Du Bois, The Souls of Black People, Chapter 3,^[5]

     […] they know that the low social level of the mass of the race is responsible for much discrimination against it, but they also know, and the nation knows, that relentless color-prejudice is more often a cause than a result of the Negro’s degradation; they seek the abatement of this relic of barbarism, and not its systematic encouragement and pampering by all agencies of social power from the Associated Press to the Church of Christ.

2. Something old and outdated, possibly kept for sentimental reasons.
   • 1847, Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre, Volume I, Chapter 11, p. 197,^[6]

     […] the imperfect light entering by their narrow casements showed bedsteads of a hundred years old; chests in oak or walnut, looking, with their strange carvings of palm branches and cherubs’ heads, like types of the Hebrew ark; rows of venerable chairs, high-backed and narrow; stools still more antiquated, on whose cushioned tops were yet apparent traces of half-effaced embroideries, wrought by fingers that for two generations had been coffin-dust. All these relics gave to the third storey of Thornfield Hall the aspect of a home of the past: a shrine of memory.

   • 1991, U.S. News & World Report (volume 116, issues 9-16, page 72)

     Published in 1982, the now out-of-print computer guide is a real relic, full of dozens of black-and-white pictures of large, bulky computers that you would sooner find in the Smithsonian than on anybody's desk today.

3. (religion) A part of the body of a saint, or an ancient religious object, kept for veneration.
   • 1623, John Webster, The Duchess of Malfi, Act III, Scene 2,^[7]

     Why should only I,

     Of all the other princes of the world,

     Be cas’d up like a holy relic?

   • 1748, Tobias Smollett, The Adventures of Roderick Random, London: J. Osborn, Volume 2, Chapter 57, p. 226,^[8]

     No Anchorite in the exstasy of devotion, ever adored a relique with more fervour than that with which I kissed this inimitable proof of my charmer’s candour, generosity and affection!

   • 1762, David Hume, The History of England, London: A. Millar, Volume I, Chapter 3, p. 135,^[9]

     […] the duke, in order to support their drooping hopes, ordered a procession to be made with the reliques of St. Valori, and prayers to be said for more favourable weather.

   • 1920, Edith Wharton, The Age of Innocence, Book 2, Chapter 34,^[10]

     During that time he had been living with his youthful memory of her; but she had doubtless had other and more tangible companionship. Perhaps she too had kept her memory of him as something apart; but if she had, it must have been like a relic in a small dim chapel, where there was not time to pray every day....

Usage notes

By comparison with synonyms, relic emphasizes age, and to some degree value – a “relic of a lost civilization”.

Synonyms

• (that which remains): remnant, remainder, residue, lave; See also Thesaurus:remainder
• (that which is regarded as ancient, rare, or sacred): halidom

Derived terms

• Relic Sunday

Related terms

• delict
• delinquent
• derelict
• relict
• relinquish
• reliquary

Translations

Verb

relic (third-person singular simple present relics, present participle relicing or relicking, simple past and past participle reliced or relicked)

1. (transitive, uncommon, often of guitars) To cause (an object) to appear old or worn, to distress.

Further reading

• relic in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• relic in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.
• relic at OneLook Dictionary Search

Old Irish

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?r??el?i??/

Verb

·relic

1. third-person singular perfect prototonic of léicid

Mutation