dragon's teeth

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The Word of the Day for September 14 is:

dragon's teeth   \DRAG-unz-TEETH\   noun
    *1 : seeds of strife 
     2 : wedge-shaped concrete antitank barriers laid in 
multiple rows 

Example sentence: 
     The political analyst insisted that the government's policy 
was misguided and would only sow dragon's teeth by increasing 
poverty and discontent.

Did you know? 
     In Nathaniel Hawthorne's _The Scarlet Letter_, Hester 
Prynne's child, Pearl, is said to have "never created a friend, 
but seemed always to be sowing broadcast the dragon's teeth, 
whence sprung a harvest of armed enemies, against whom she 
rushed to battle." In Hawthorne and elsewhere, "dragon's teeth" 
alludes to a story involving Cadmus, the legendary Phoenician 
hero reputed to have founded Thebes and invented the alphabet. 
The tale holds that Cadmus killed a dragon and planted its teeth 
in the ground. From the teeth sprang fierce armed men who 
battled one another until all were dead but five. These founded 
the noblest families of Thebes and helped build its citadel. 

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.