"Nessus shirt" meaning in English

{
  "etymology_text": "In Greek mythology, a shirt (chiton) soaked with the poisoned blood of the centaur Nessus that killed Heracles upon wearing it.",
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "Nessus shirts",
      "tags": [
        "plural"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "Nessus shirt (plural Nessus shirts)",
      "name": "en-noun"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
            "Entries with incorrect language header",
            "Entry maintenance"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Entries with translation boxes",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Pages with 1 entry",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Pages with entries",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Terms with French translations",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Terms with German translations",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "topical",
          "langcode": "en",
          "name": "Greek mythology",
          "orig": "en:Greek mythology",
          "parents": [
            "Ancient Greece",
            "Mythology",
            "Ancient Europe",
            "Ancient Near East",
            "History of Greece",
            "Culture",
            "Ancient history",
            "History of Europe",
            "Ancient Asia",
            "Greece",
            "History of Asia",
            "Society",
            "History",
            "Europe",
            "Asia",
            "All topics",
            "Earth",
            "Eurasia",
            "Fundamental",
            "Nature"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "1920, Edward Carpenter, Pagan and Christian Creeds, New York: Harcourt, Brace and Co., published 1921, page 189:",
          "text": "No wonder then that, with this age-long suppression (necessary in a sense though it may have been) which marks the Christian dispensation, there should have been associated endless Sickness and Crime and sordid Poverty, the Crucifixion of animals in the name of Science and of human workers in the name of Wealth, and wars and horrors innumerable! Hercules writhing in the Nessus-shirt or Prometheus nailed to the rocks are only as figures of a toy miniature compared with this vision of the great and divine Spirit of Man caught in the clutches of those dread Diseases which through the centuries have been eating into his very heart and vitals.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "A fatal present or inescapable fate."
      ],
      "id": "en-Nessus_shirt-en-noun-oyY--1pG",
      "links": [
        [
          "present",
          "present"
        ],
        [
          "fate",
          "fate"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(figuratively) A fatal present or inescapable fate."
      ],
      "related": [
        {
          "word": "poisoned chalice"
        }
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "word": "Nessus' shirt"
        },
        {
          "word": "shirt of Nessus"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
        "figuratively"
      ],
      "translations": [
        {
          "code": "fr",
          "lang": "French",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "tags": [
            "feminine"
          ],
          "word": "tunique de Nessus"
        },
        {
          "code": "de",
          "lang": "German",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "tags": [
            "neuter"
          ],
          "word": "Nessushemd"
        },
        {
          "code": "de",
          "lang": "German",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "tags": [
            "neuter"
          ],
          "word": "Nessusgewand"
        }
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "Nessus shirt"
}

{
  "etymology_text": "In Greek mythology, a shirt (chiton) soaked with the poisoned blood of the centaur Nessus that killed Heracles upon wearing it.",
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "Nessus shirts",
      "tags": [
        "plural"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "Nessus shirt (plural Nessus shirts)",
      "name": "en-noun"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "related": [
    {
      "word": "poisoned chalice"
    }
  ],
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "English countable nouns",
        "English entries with incorrect language header",
        "English eponyms",
        "English lemmas",
        "English multiword terms",
        "English nouns",
        "English terms with quotations",
        "Entries with translation boxes",
        "Pages with 1 entry",
        "Pages with entries",
        "Terms with French translations",
        "Terms with German translations",
        "Translation table header lacks gloss",
        "en:Greek mythology"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "1920, Edward Carpenter, Pagan and Christian Creeds, New York: Harcourt, Brace and Co., published 1921, page 189:",
          "text": "No wonder then that, with this age-long suppression (necessary in a sense though it may have been) which marks the Christian dispensation, there should have been associated endless Sickness and Crime and sordid Poverty, the Crucifixion of animals in the name of Science and of human workers in the name of Wealth, and wars and horrors innumerable! Hercules writhing in the Nessus-shirt or Prometheus nailed to the rocks are only as figures of a toy miniature compared with this vision of the great and divine Spirit of Man caught in the clutches of those dread Diseases which through the centuries have been eating into his very heart and vitals.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "A fatal present or inescapable fate."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "present",
          "present"
        ],
        [
          "fate",
          "fate"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(figuratively) A fatal present or inescapable fate."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "figuratively"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "synonyms": [
    {
      "word": "Nessus' shirt"
    },
    {
      "word": "shirt of Nessus"
    }
  ],
  "translations": [
    {
      "code": "fr",
      "lang": "French",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "tags": [
        "feminine"
      ],
      "word": "tunique de Nessus"
    },
    {
      "code": "de",
      "lang": "German",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "tags": [
        "neuter"
      ],
      "word": "Nessushemd"
    },
    {
      "code": "de",
      "lang": "German",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "tags": [
        "neuter"
      ],
      "word": "Nessusgewand"
    }
  ],
  "word": "Nessus shirt"
}