agon

Etymology

From Latin agōn, from Ancient Greek ἀγών (agṓn, “contest”).

noun

1. (countable) A struggle or contest; conflict; especially between the protagonist and antagonist in a literary work.
   It was not ecological pressure or shortages of protein, as anthropologist Marvin Harris has claimed; institutionalized violence, as opposed to the stylized agons of hunters over grievances, was the shadow side of the Neolithic Revolution. 1981, William Irwin Thompson, The Time Falling Bodies Take to Light: Mythology, Sexuality and the Origins of Culture, London: Rider/Hutchinson & Co., page 134
2. (countable) An intellectual conflict or apparent competition of ideas.
   Freud's originality stemmed from his aggression and ambition in his agon with biology. March 23, 1986, Harold Bloom, “Freud, the Greatest Modern Writer”, in New York Times
   The point, though, is that to fully and uncritically surrender to such agon against individuals is to invite one's own ethical degeneration; […] 2022, China Miéville, chapter 6, in A Spectre, Haunting: On the Communist Manifesto, →OCLC
3. (countable) A contest in ancient Greece, as in athletics or music, in which prizes were awarded.
4. (uncountable) A two-player board game played on a hexagonally-tiled board, popular in Victorian times.