Reference > Brewer’s Dictionary > Nepen’the (3 syl.) or Nepen’ths,

 Ne’optol’emos or Pyrrhos.Neper’s Bones. 
CONTENTS · BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD
E. Cobham Brewer 1810–1897. Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. 1898.
 
Nepen’the (3 syl.) or Nepen’ths,
 
a drug to drive away care and superinduce love. Polydamna, wife of Tho’nis (or Thone, 1 syl.), King of Egypt, gave nepenthe to Helen (daughter of Jove and Leda). Homer speaks of a magic potion called nepenth, which made persons forget their woes. (Odyssey, iv. 228.)   1
       
“That nepenthes which the wife of Thone
In Egypt gave the Jove-born Helena.”
       
Milton: Comus, 695, 696.
   The water of Ardenne had the opposite effect.   2
 


 Ne’optol’emos or Pyrrhos.Neper’s Bones. 

 
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