	Site Map \| FAQ in Daily Almanac for Dec 10, 2009 Search White Pages
Skip Navigation Home Winter Holidays Atlas Encyclopedia Dictionary Thesaurus Features Quizzes Timelines Countries Slideshows

Fact Monster Kid's reference,
games, quizzes

Editor's Favorites

Dictionary of Phrase and Fable—I

Iconoclasts

(Greek, “image breakers”). Reformers who rose in the eighth century, especially averse to the employment of pictures, statues, emblems, and all visible representations of sacred objects. The crusade against these things began in 726 with the Emperor Leo III., and continued for one hundred and twenty years. (Greek, ikon, an image; klao, I break.)

“The eighth century, the age of the Iconoclasts, had not been favourable to literature.” —Isaac Taylor: The Alphabet, vol, ii. chap. viii. p. 159.

Source: Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, E. Cobham Brewer, 1894

Idæan Mother

Icon Basilike

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

Iconoclasts

More on Iconoclasts from Infoplease:

Related Content