homonym

noun [ˈhɔmənɪm]

pronunciation

CMU Pronouncing Dictionary (homonym HH AO1 M AH0 N IH0 M) via pipeline/ipa-en.mjs; lemma present, open source

A homonym is a word that coincides with another in writing or sound while the sense stays different, unlike polysemy inside one unit.

source

Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)

Definitions

ling. A lexical item that coincides in form with another item while the meanings stay apart. A full homonym unites spelling and pronunciation; a homograph covers writing, a homophone covers sound. Polysemy is different: several related senses inside one unit, not two matching forms.

source
Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)
hist. lex. Webster 1913 prints HOMONYM (Hom"o*nym) for items that share sound yet differ in sense, with the pair bear (noun) / bear (verb); also spelled homonyme. Nearby stand HOMONYMOUS and HOMONYMY. The Warsaw Arct (1921) lists Homonimy with Homonimja. Skeat 1910 derives the noun under HOMONYMOUS.

source
Editorial team; facts: Webster 1913 (HOMONYM; HOMONYMOUS; HOMONYMY); M. Arct 1921 (Homonimy; Homonimja); W. W. Skeat 1910 (HOMONYMOUS), open source
hist. / ety. Skeat 1910 under HOMONYMOUS traces L. homonymus and Gk. ὁμώνυμος to ὁμός (same; cognate with E. same) plus ὄνυμα / ὄνομα (name); the noun comes from F. homonyme (Cotgrave), hence homonymy. Brückner places the Polish lemma on p. 480 with Greek homos. Detail sits under etymology.

source
Editorial team; facts: W. W. Skeat 1910 (HOMONYMOUS / homonym); A. Brückner 1927 (homonim, p. 480), open source
colloq. Away from class, the label often covers any shared name or bare ambiguity that never asks whether identity is spelling, sound, or both. This page keeps matching form with a different meaning in focus, not a complaint about mixed words alone.

source
Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)

Examples

In class the homonym worksheet sat beside polysemy notes and a name list that never split spelling from sound.

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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)
Lexical semantics devoted an hour to homonym; homographs and homophones filled a separate lab drill.

source
Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)
Reading card: Webster 1913 (HOMONYM, bear / bear); Arct 1921 (Homonimy; Homonimja); Skeat 1910 (HOMONYMOUS); Brückner 1927 p. 480.

source
Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)
A gloss that equated a full homonym with polysemy flattened the topic into talk of two senses of one word.

source
Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)
She set a homonym pair beside a synonym card and an antonym card to mark where matching form stopped.

source
Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)

Usage

Outside seminars, speakers often paste homonym onto any shared name or onto bare ambiguity. Class notes keep separate layers: Webster's matching-sound frame with the bear / bear pair, Skeat's Greek nest under HOMONYMOUS (ὁμός + ὄνομα; F. homonyme), Arct's Homonimy and Homonimja, and Brückner's index at Greek homos. When those layers drop away, only a complaint about mixed words remains.

source

Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)

Webster 1913 under HOMONYM marks Hom"o*nym, records matching sound with a different meaning, gives bear (noun) / bear (verb), and notes the spelling homonyme. Skeat 1910 under HOMONYMOUS keeps L. homonymus and Gk. ὁμώνυμος, takes the noun from F. homonyme, and adds homonymy; he also notes homo-phonous from Gk. φωνή. Arct (1921) records Homonimy together with Homonimja. Brückner (1927) has the lemma on p. 480. Facts here; etymology in its own field.

source

Editorial team; facts: Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, 1913 (HOMONYM); W. W. Skeat 1910 (HOMONYMOUS / homonym); M. Arct 1921 (Homonimy; Homonimja); A. Brückner 1927 (homonim, p. 480), open source

In scholarly English the label covers matching form with a different meaning (Webster stresses primarily same sound). Careful prose refuses sheets that never say which axis of form is meant, and refuses polysemy tags that treat several senses as one stock. Writers still argue about borders. Treating every look-alike string as a full homonym empties the term. Dates for institutes that study such pairs stay blank without a primary source.

source

Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)

Seminar rooms return to form identity, semantics, and the contrast with polysemy versus synonym and antonym pairs. Classroom adjectives and nouns include homonymous and homonymy (both printed in Webster 1913). Careful writers refuse prose that skips the spelling-or-sound axis. Borders remain open for review. The Polish match is homonim.

source

Editorial team; facts: Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, 1913 (HOMONYM; HOMONYMOUS; HOMONYMY); M. Arct 1921 (Homonimy), open source

Word forms

Countable noun in ordinary scholarly use (a homonym; several homonyms). Classroom adjective: homonymous (Webster 1913: HOMONYMOUS). Related noun: homonymy (Webster 1913: HOMONYMY).

forms in use

przypadek	forma
singular	homonym
plural	homonyms
adjective	homonymous (Webster 1913: HOMONYMOUS)
related noun	homonymy (Webster 1913: HOMONYMY)

Word forms: Editorial team; facts: Webster 1913 (HOMONYM; HOMONYMOUS; HOMONYMY) · source

Collocations

lexical homonym

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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)
pair of homonyms

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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)
full homonym

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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)
distinguish homonyms

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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)
homonym versus polysemy

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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)

Synonyms · Antonyms

Synonyms word of matching form with a different meaning (near neighbour; Webster stresses same sound; confirm scope at review), same-sounding word of different meaning (near neighbour in Arct Homonimy; confirm scope at review), homonim (classroom Polish match; confirm scope at review)

source

Editorial team; facts: Webster 1913 (HOMONYM), open source

Antonyms a word with a clearly different form (lexical foil versus matching form; confirm scope at review), a polysemous unit (contrast: one unit, several senses versus separate units of matching form; not a strict antonym of the label alone), a different-word, different-form tag with no named sense (contrastive neighbour; confirm at review)

source

Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)

Etymology

English homonym joins Greek ὁμο- / ὁμός (same, equal; Skeat: cognate with E. same) to the ὄνυμα / ὄνομα nest (name) and points to the same name while the sense differs. Webster 1913 prints HOMONYM (stress Hom"o*nym), cites F. homonyme, points to HOMONYMOUS, and records matching sound with a different meaning (bear noun / bear verb), also spelling homonyme. Skeat 1910 under HOMONYMOUS derives L. homonymus and Gk. ὁμώνυμος from ὁμός plus ὄνυμα/ὄνομα, takes the noun from F. homonyme (Cotgrave: a word of divers significations), and adds homonymy; he notes homo-phonous from Gk. φωνή. Arct's Warsaw foreign-word lexicon (9th ed., 1921) prints Homonimy (same-sounding words of different meaning) and Homonimja (logic: ambiguity). Brückner 1927 lists Polish homonim on p. 480 and links Greek homos under sam. Dictionary wording is not copied into the site text. The Polish match is homonim.

source

Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, 1913 (HOMONYM: Hom"o*nym; Cf. F. homonyme; HOMONYMOUS), open source

also

W. W. Skeat, An Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, 4th ed., Oxford 1910 (HOMONYMOUS: Gk. ὁμώνυμος / ὁμός + ὄνυμα/ὄνομα; F. homonyme; homonym; homonymy), open source

also

M. Arct, Słownik wyrazów obcych, 9th ed., Warsaw 1921 (Homonimy; Homonimja), open source

also

A. Brückner, Słownik etymologiczny języka polskiego, Kraków 1927 (homonim, index p. 480; Greek homos under sam), open source

Related words

homonymous , adjective tied to the field (Webster 1913: HOMONYMOUS)
homonymy , related noun (Webster 1913: HOMONYMY; Skeat: Der. from HOMONYMOUS; Arct: Homonimja)
homograph , neighbour: shared spelling when sound may differ; not always a full homonym
homophone , neighbour: shared sound when spelling may differ; Skeat notes homo-phonous (Gk. φωνή)
polysemy , contrastive neighbour: one unit, several related senses versus separate units of matching form
synonym , lexical neighbour: a near-equivalent unit; live EN pair
antonym , lexical neighbour: an opposite unit; live EN pair
homonim , related Polish noun (Arct: Homonimy; Webster: HOMONYM; Skeat: homonym; Brückner: homonim p. 480)

Related entries

The same entry in Polish: homonim

Questions and answers

What does homonym mean?

It labels a word that coincides with another in spelling and/or sound while the meaning differs. A full homonym unites spelling and pronunciation; homograph and homophone are narrower axes. Polysemy keeps several senses inside one unit; near-equivalents and opposites describe sense relations, not shared form.

source

Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)

Where does the word homonym come from?

From Greek ὁμός (same) plus ὄνομα / ὄνυμα (name). Webster 1913 prints HOMONYM (Hom"o*nym) with F. homonyme. Skeat 1910 derives the noun under HOMONYMOUS. The 1921 Arct lexicon carries Homonimy plus Homonimja. In Brückner 1927 the Polish headword sits on p. 480 next to Greek homos.

source

Editorial team; facts: Webster 1913; W. W. Skeat 1910; M. Arct 1921; A. Brückner 1927, open source

How is homonym pronounced, and which forms belong with it?

Read /ˈhɔmənɪm/ from CMUdict (HH AO1 M AH0 N IH0 M) through pipeline/ipa-en.mjs; the lemma is present. Plural: homonyms. Adjective: homonymous (Webster). Related noun: homonymy (Webster). Confirm vowels and stress at review.

source

Editorial team; facts: CMU Pronouncing Dictionary via pipeline/ipa-en.mjs (lemma present); Webster 1913 (Hom"o*nym; HOMONYMOUS; HOMONYMY), open source

How does homonym differ from polysemy, homograph, homophone, synonym, and antonym, and does Polish homonim match?

Homonym keeps matching form with a different meaning across separate units. Polysemy gathers several senses inside one unit. Homograph / homophone name spelling or sound alone. Synonym points to nearness of sense; antonym points to contrast. Polish homonim is the paired label. Teaching notes draw the lines; everyday speech often blends the labels.

source

Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)