arcane

Meanings

1. 1
   adj

   requiring secret or mysterious knowledge

   the arcane science of dowsing

2. 2
   adj

   Understood by only a few.

   arcane rituals

3. 3
   adj

   Obscure, mysterious.

   arcane origins

4. 4
   adj

   Requiring secret or mysterious knowledge to understand.

   1997: Chris Horrocks, Introducing Foucault, page 67, The Renaissance Episteme (Totem Books, Icon Books; →ISBN A “signature” was placed on all things by God to indicate their affinities — but it was hidden, hence the search for arcane knowledge. Knowing was guessing and interpreting, not observing or demonstrating.

5. 5
   adj

   Extremely old (e.g. interpretation or knowledge), and possibly irrelevant.

   an arcane law

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin arcānus (“hidden, secret”), from arceō (“to shut up, enclose”); cognate with Latin arca (“a chest”).