ineluctable
/ɪn.ɪˈlʌk.tə.bəl/
ineluctable means impossible to avoid or escape; inescapable, irresistible. It carries an Arena rating of 1919, earned across 40 head-to-head judged battles.
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, ineluctable ranks #140 of 42,749 for Qualifying, #522 of 17,128 for Most Ponderous Words, #539 of 17,131 for Scariest Words, #782 of 17,124 for Most Sublime Words.
ineluctable is pronounced /ɪn.ɪˈlʌk.tə.bəl/.
Why “ineluctable” is a great word
Impossible to avoid or escape, especially by struggling against it; inescapable and irresistible. From Latin inēlūctābilis, from in- (“not”) + ēlūctārī (“to struggle out, force one’s way out”) + -bilis (“able to be”), first attested in English in the 1620s. Unlike “inevitable,” which suggests a simple, mechanistic certainty, or “unavoidable,” which states a plain fact of circumnavigation, “ineluctable” carries the specific, crushing weight of struggle proven futile. It is the tide that drags the swimmer seaward despite his strongest stroke, the slow drag of sinking mud at the river’s edge, the grief that returns at the scent of rain on hot stone—a pressure that concedes nothing to our pushing back, the recognition that some forces hold us fast while we exhaust ourselves against them.
Etymology
From Middle French inéluctable (whence in- + e- and -able), from Latin inēlūctābilis, from in- + ēlūctor (“struggle out”) + -bilis.
adj
- Impossible to avoid or escape; inescapable, irresistible.e.g.“God indeed (if it please him) can by his absolute power over his Creature, make him act this thing, or take that thing, by ineluctable Necessity, and whether he will or no.” — 1655, Thomas Pierce, A Correct Copy of Some Notes concerning Gods Decrees, "A Paraenesis to the Reader," chapter 4, item 50
Definitions & examples from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 3.0).
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