The Nuttall Encyclopedia

1. Xantippe

   the name of the wife of Socrates, a woman of a peevish and shrewish disposition, the subject of exaggerated gossip in Athens, to the exaltation of the temper of her husband, which it never ruffled. She is quaintly described by an old English writer as "a passing shrewde, curste, and wayward woman, wife to the pacient and wise philosopher Socrates."