Also svast-, -ica. [Skr. svastika, f. svastí well-being, fortune, luck, f. sú good + astí being (f. as to be).] A primitive symbol or ornament of the form of a cross with equal arms with a limb of the same length projecting at right angles from the end of each arm, all in the same direction and (usually) clockwise; also called GAMMADION and FYLFOT. Also attrib.
[Adopted as the symbol of Adolf Hitler’s German National Socialist party, or Nazis, and consequently synonymous with ultimate evil.]
1841. W. H. Sykes, Notes India, 208. It is also found with the other Buddhist emblems, wheel and swastica, on the Indo-Bactrian coins.
1871. Alabaster, Wheel of Law, 249. On the great toe is the Trisul. On each side of the others a Swastika.
1882. E. C. Robertson in Proc. Berw. Nat. Club, IX. No. 3. 516. In Japan … the cross-like symbol of the sun, the Swastica, is put on coffins.
1895. Reliquary, Oct., 252. The use of the Swastica cross in mediaeval times.
1904. Times, 27 Aug., 10/3. [In Tibet] a few white, straitened hovels in tiers…. On the door of each is a kicking swastika in white, and over it a rude daub of ball and crescent.
1930. Knoxville News-Sentinel, 31 Oct., 15/4. In the past few years, the embargo on photographs has been lifted by Hitler. He has been ‘shot’ time and time again, surrounded by his cheering hosts of Nazis, with Swastika banners waving to the breeze.
