Synonym: Word or phrase that means exactly or nearly the same as another word or phrase in the same language
A synonym is a word (or a phrase) which means the same thing as another word or phrase.
Examples:
- car and automobile
- baby and infant
- child and kid
- make and create.
- student and pupil
- sick and ill
- scared and frightened
- rich and wealthy
Synonyms can be nouns, verbs, adverbs or adjectives, but both words must be of the same part of speech. That means, only a noun can be a synonym of another noun, only a verb can be a synonym of another verb, and so on.
One can find sets of synonyms in a thesaurus, which is a book listing groups of related words.
Some words are near-synonyms, which have similar but not exactly the same meaning.
Examples of proper nouns, such as names of these languages, having synonyms or near-synonyms include:
History
The word "synonym" dates back over 500 years, to late Middle English. The term is derived from Latin from the Greek word sunōnumon, neuter form (used as a noun) of the adjective sunōnumos, from sun- meaning 'with' + onoma meaning 'name' in the Greek language.
The meaning of the word has remained unchanged for all these centuries. There is even a saying, going back to 1892, "Once a synonym, always a synonym". The word has been taught to generations of English-language students and is commonly known by the general public. Many other languages have a similar word for "synonym" with the same or similar spelling.
Related pages
References
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