(A ). A remark more biting than Zeno's. Nearchos
ordered Zeno the philosopher to be pounded to death in a mortar. When
he had been pounded some time, he told Nearchos he had an important
secret to communicate to him; but, when the tyrant bent over the mortar
to hear what Zeno had to say, the dying man bit off his ear.
“That would have been a biting jest.”
Shakespeare: Richard III.,
act ii. 4.
Source: Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, E. Cobham Brewer, 1894
