Noun

(en-noun)

(uncountable) The state or quality of being aggressive.

(countable) The result or product of being aggressive.

Noun

(historical) In ancient Athens (and some other cities), the temporary banishment by popular vote of a citizen considered dangerous to the state.

* {{quote-book, year=1579, year_published=1898, author=(Thomas North), by=(Plutarch)

, title= Plutarch's Lives , section=Themistocles, volume=2, page=35 , passage= For this manner of banishment for a time, called ostracismos , was no punishment for any fault committed, but a mitigation and taking away of the envy of the people, which delighted to pluck down their stomacks that too much seemed to exceed in greatness:

* {{quote-book, year=1588, year_published=1886, author=

, title= The life and complete works in prose and verse of Robert Greene , chapter=Perimedes the Blacke-Smith, editor=(Alexander Balloch Grosart), volume=7, page=19 , passage=

*, II.32:

*:Witnesse the Ostracisme'' amongst the Athenians, and the ''Petalisme among the Siracusans.

(figuratively) Banishment by some general consent.

* {{quote-book, year=1602—3, year_published=1994, author=(Lady Arbella Stuart)

, title= The Letters of Lady Arbella Stuart , publisher=Oxford University Press, location=New York, editor=Sara Jayne Steen, page=171 , passage=If I have deserved the land should spue me out, I will feed my selfe with the idle and windy conceite of an Ostracisme , and my unregarded poore selfe shall be all the richesse and commpany I crave to transport and if a Princes word

Temporary exclusion from a community or society.