The Collaborative International Dictionary
Polemarch \Pol"e*march\, n. [Gr. ?; ? war + ? leader, from ? to be first.] (Gr. Antiq.) In Athens, originally, the military commanderin-chief; but, afterward, a civil magistrate who had jurisdiction in respect of strangers and sojourners. In other Grecian cities, a high military and civil officer.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
"commander of the army" in Greek history, 1570s, from Greek polemarkhos "one who begins or leads a war," from polemos "war" + arkhos "leader, chief, ruler" (see archon).
Wiktionary
n. 1 (context historical Ancient Greece originally English) The military commander in chief in Athens. 2 (context historical Ancient Greece English) A civil magistrate in Athens who had jurisdiction in respect of strangers and sojourners. 3 (context historical Ancient Greece English) In other Greek cities, a high military and civil officer.
Wikipedia
A polemarch (, from , polemarchos) was a senior military title in various ancient Greek city states (poleis). The title is composed out of the polemos (war) and archon (ruler/leader) and translates as "warleader" or "warlord", one of the nine archontes (ἄρχοντες) appointed annually in Athens. The name indicates that the polemarchos' original function was to command the army; presumably the office was created to take over this function from the king. Eventually military command was transferred to the strategoi (στρατηγοί), but the date and stages of the transfer are not clear. At Marathon in 490 BC the strategoi debated and voted on strategy, but Callimachus the polemarch had a casting vote, and he was the leader; it is disputed whether that means he was the real, or merely the titular commander-in-chief. Certainly the polemarchos no longer had military authority after 487/486 BC, when archontes were appointed by lot and it could not be expected that every polemarch would make a competent commander.
Thereafter the polemarch's main functions were legal. In the 4th Century BC, he had charge of trials of metics' family, inheritance, and status cases, and of the allocation to tribe-judges (members of the Forty) of other private actions involving metics; and it is likely that at an earlier period, his responsibilities for cases involving aliens were more extensive. He also conducted certain sacrifices and arranged the funeral ceremony for men killed in war.
Usage examples of "polemarch".
At that time the main danger had come from the Polemarch, and Bean wrote an anonymous letter to a couple of opinion leaders on Earth, Locke and Demosthenes, urging them to get all the Battle School children back to Earth so they couldn't be seized or killed by the Polemarch's forces in the League War.
How Bean knew all this he wouldn't tell, but the information was indelibly planted in their memories, tied as it was with those tense days after their victory over the Formics and before the defeat of the Polemarch in his attempt to take over the IF.
You are the only possible Polemarch who could secure the International Fleet.
You, as Polemarch, could reassign suspect Chinese to innocuous postings, preventing any Chinese grab for control.
If you return to Earth, and Achilles has influence over your successor as Polemarch, the I.
They would have kept the number of plotters as small as possible -- perhaps only the triumvirate of Hegemon, Strategos, and Polemarch and maybe a few people here at Battle School.
Thus the Polemarch and the Strategos had far more money at their disposal than the Hegemon, which made him, though first in title, weakest in actual power and independence of movement.
On the nets a demagogue named Demosthenes is inflaming the West about illegal and secret maneuvers by the Polemarch to give an advantage to the New Warsaw Pact, and the propaganda is even more virulent from Moscow, Baghdad, Buenos Aires, Beijing.
In fact, the Russians used their domination of the office of the Polemarch to build up a network of officers in key places throughout the fleet.
There are Russian marines all over Eros, and the Polemarch is Russian.
Some of the Russians who came in told us that when the Polemarch ordered them to find you and kill you, they almost killed him.