Word of the Day

myrmidon \MUR-muh-don; -duhn\, noun:
1. [Capitalized] A member of a warlike Thessalian people who followed Achilles on the expedition against Troy.
2. A loyal follower, especially one who executes orders without question, protest, or pity.

He risked assassination, torture or... retaliation, the defining signatures of Mr. Milosevic and his ultranationalist myrmidons.
--Bruce Fein, "Follow U.S. war crimes advice?" Washington Times, May 10, 2001

Those who created EMU [(European) Economic and Monetary Union] -- mainly politicians and their myrmidons in the offices and conference rooms of Brussels -- portray a beckoning landscape of wealth, liberty and economic power that will rival the United States and surpass Asia.
--James O. Jackson, "The One-Way Bridge," Time, May 11, 1998

Myrmidon derives from Greek Myrmidones, a warlike people of ancient Thessaly.