Word of the Day: Chiliarch

It's a sudden hankering for fast food, namely the fantastic chili that used to be on offer at places like Wendy's, and perhaps even the somewhat (these days) desiccated meat of the golden arches, which brought this word to mind. I can just imagine what it evokes in the gluttonish soul of my compatriots: chili-arch, king of capsaicin and oral terrorism.

But the word is a wholly different one, pronounced in the Greek way "kili-ark'. It denotes a master of a thousand men, a responsible leader with both martial and civil duties, able to help and to command in both war and peace. Alexander the Great used to deploy five to a battle unit: an infantry brigade of 5000 men marching with a common leadership of five chiliarchs under a single warleader.

It isn't much of a WotD, I guess. The Hierophant told me to choose more interesting words. Ah well. I can't help it; I have days in which a word like zeugma is of great import, and others in which the word is more like bungalow – a great import from another tongue, but much less interesting.