I-ō'ni-an or I-ōn'ic, a.

a. [Lat. Ionicus, Gr. Ἰωνικός, belonging or relating to Ionia.] (Geog.) Pertaining to Ionia, in Greece, or to the Ionians.

Ionic dialect (Gr. Gram.), a dialect of the Greek language, used in Ionia. — Ionic foot (Pros.), a foot of four syllables, either two short and two long, or two long and two short. — Ionic mode (Mus.), an airy kind of music. Reckoning from grave to acute, it was the middle of the five modes. — Ionic order (Arch.), an order characterized by a species of column whose distinguishing feature is the volute of its capital, and so called from Ionia, in Greece. The column is more slender than the Doric and Tuscan, but less slender and less ornamented than the Corinthian and Composite. It is simple, but majestic. Its height is about eighteen modules, and that of the entablature four and a half. — Ionic sect, a sect of philosophers founded by Thales of Miletus, in Ionia. Their distinguishing tenet was, that water is the principle of all natural things.