Chiasmus

Chiasmus is a figure of speech based on inverted parallelism. It is a rhetorical figure in which two clauses are related to each another through a reversal of terms in order to make a larger point. In Latin in particular, it was used to articulate balance or order within the text in which it was included.

See also

• Antanaclasis
• Antimetabole
• Chiastic structure
• Figure of speech
• Rhetoric
• Spoonerism
• Synchysis (the reverse of the chiasmus)