the.com/malleability
The art of bending without breaking, whether you're metal or just agreeable at dinner parties.
means The quality of being easily shaped, influenced, or adapted — whether that's a metal under a hammer or a personality under pressure.
from From Latin malleare, 'to hammer,' from malleus, 'hammer' — the same root that gives us 'mallet.' The word first described literal metalworking: a malleable metal is one that spreads under the blacksmith's hammer instead of cracking. By extension, English borrowed the image for anything — minds, opinions, people — that can be pounded into a new shape without shattering.
- origin
- from latin malleus, meaning hammer
- gold medal
- one gram stretches into a 1-mile wire
- opposite flex
- brittle materials shatter instead of bending
- human use
- describes people, memories, and markets too