dii ex machinis

English

Noun

dii ex machinis

1. (rare) plural of deus ex machina
   • 1839, John Richard Darley, A Treatise on Homer: With Miscellaneous Questions, Samuel J. Machen, page 72:

     […] hence, the gods in the Iliad are never “ Dii ex machinis,” they are providential and governing, they prepare the conflict, mature the crisis, […]

   • 1882: The Dublin Journal of Medical Science, volume № 73, page 329 (Fannin & Co.)

     […] assume nervous influences of which the student has no knowledge, and which he must provisionally regard as dii ex machinis, to be looked-up afterwards.

   • 2005: Christoph Clausen, Macbeth Multiplied: Negotiating Historical and Medial Difference Between Shakespeare and Verdi, page 161 (Rodopi; ISBN 90‒420‒1887‒9, 978‒90‒420‒1887‒7)

     In John Gay’s The Beggar’s Opera (1728), the ludicrously contrived last-minute rescue of Maceath works as a deliberate deflation of opera’s various dii ex machinis.