Synonym

This article is about the general meaning of the term "synonym". For biological synonyms, see Synonym (taxonomy).

Synonym list in cuneiform on a clay tablet, Neo-Assyrian period. Ref:K.4375 .

Synonyms are different words with almost identical or similar meanings. Words that are synonyms are said to be synonymous, and the state of being a synonym is called synonymy. The word comes from Ancient Greek syn (σύν) ("with") and onoma (ὄνομα) ("name"). The words car and automobile are synonyms. Similarly, if we talk about a long time or an extended time, long and extended become synonyms. In the figurative sense, two words are often said to be synonymous if they have the same connotation:

"a widespread impression that... Hollywood was synonymous with immorality" (Doris Kearns Goodwin)

Synonyms can be any part of speech (such as nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs or prepositions), as long as both members of the pair are the same part of speech. Here are more examples of English synonyms:

• verb
  • "buy" and "purchase"
• adjective
  • "sick" and "ill"
• adverb
  • "quickly" and "speedily"
• preposition
  • "on" and "upon"

Note that synonyms are defined with respect to certain senses of words; for instance, pupil as the "aperture in the iris of the eye" is not synonymous with student. Similarly, he expired means the same as he died, yet my passport has expired cannot be replaced by my passport has died.

In English, many synonyms evolved from the parallel use, in the early medieval period, of Norman French (from Latin) and Old English (Anglo-Saxon) words, often with some words being used principally by the Saxon peasantry ("folk", "freedom", "bowman") and their synonyms by the Norman nobility ("people", "liberty", "archer").

Some lexicographers claim that no synonyms have exactly the same meaning (in all contexts or social levels of language) because etymology, orthography, phonic qualities, ambiguous meanings, usage, etc. make them unique. Different words that are similar in meaning usually differ for a reason: feline is more formal than cat; long and extended are only synonyms in one usage and not in others (for example, a long arm is not the same as an extended arm). Synonyms are also a source of euphemisms.

The purpose of a thesaurus is to offer the user a listing of similar or related words; these are often, but not always, synonyms.

Related terms

Antonyms are words with opposite or nearly opposite meanings. For example: 'hot' => 'cold', 'large' => 'small', 'fresh' => 'stale'

Hypernyms and hyponyms are words that refer to, respectively, a general category and a specific instance of that category. For example, vehicle is a hypernym of car, and car is a hyponym of vehicle.

Homonyms are words that sound AND are spelled the same, but have different meanings.

See also

• -onym
• Synonym ring
• Thesaurus
• Cognitive synonymy
• Antonym
• Homonyms, identical or very similar words with different meanings (conceptual inversion of "synonym")

External links

• Graph Words - Online tool for visualization word relations
• Synonym Finder - Synonym finder including hypernyms in search result.
• how to say - Online Synonym finder
• Synonym.com - Synonyms Thesaurus with Antonyms & Definitions
• Thesaurus - Online synonyms in English, Italian, French and German.
• Woxikon Synonyms - Over 1 million synonyms - English, German, Spanish, French, Italian, Portuguese, Swedish and Dutch
• Free Online English Thesaurus and Dictionary. Free Online English Thesaurus and dictionary containing synonyms, related Words, antonyms, definitions, idioms, words and terms using Merriam Websters Thesaurus, Wordnet Reference and Roget's Thesaurus Definitions.
• English Synonym Dictionary - offers 500 searches for synonym per user per day
• iGoogle Gadget - Synonym Gadget for iGoogle