prodigy

From Middle English prodige (“portent”), from Latin prōdigium (“omen, portent, prophetic sign”).

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈpɹɒdɪd͡ʒi/

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• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈpɹɑdɪd͡ʒi/
• Hyphenation: prod‧i‧gy

prodigy (plural prodigies)

1. (now rare) An extraordinary thing seen as an omen; a portent. [from 15th c.]
   • 1971, Keith Thomas, Religion and the Decline of Magic, Folio Society 2012, p. 87:

     John Foxe believed that special prodigies had heralded the Reformation.

   • 1715, Homer, Iliad, translated by Alexander Pope, Book XII:

     These on the farther bank now stood and gazed,
     By Heaven alarm’d, by prodigies amazed:
     A signal omen stopp’d the passing host,
     Their martial fury in their wonder lost.

2. An extraordinary occurrence or creature; an anomaly, especially a monster; a freak. [from 16th c.]
3. An amazing or marvellous thing; a wonder. [from 17th c.]
   • 1851 November 14, Herman Melville, chapter 32, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, OCLC 57395299, page 153:

     He is never chased; he would run away with rope-walks of line. Prodigies are told of him.

4. A wonderful example of something. [from 17th c.]
5. An extremely talented person, especially a child. [from 17th c.]

• (extremely talented person): wunderkind, girl wonder, girl-genius, boy-genius, boy wonder, child prodigy.

• precocious
• prodigal
• child prodigy
• prodigy house

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