namesake
/ˈneɪmseɪk/ noun, verb
Forms namesakes namesaking namesaked
- noun An entity that lends its name to another entity.
- noun A person with the same name as another. “The statesman Winston Churchill has a namesake, the American novelist Winston Churchill.”
- noun One who is named after another, often a child named after the parent or an ancestor. “Bill Sr's namesake, Bill Jr, is 30 years younger.”
- noun One for whom another is named, often the parent or ancestor who gave the name to a child. “Bill Jr's namesake, Bill Sr, is 30 years older.”
- noun (by extension) Something (especially a ship, a building, or a medical condition, symptom, or sign) that is named after someone or something.
- verb (transitive) To name (somebody) after somebody else.
Synonyms
Etymology
Mid-17th century. Equivalent to name + sake. From the phrase “for (one's) name's sake”, first found in Bible translations as a rendering of a Calque of Hebrew לְמַעַן שְׁמוֹ (l'má'an sh'mó) idiom meaning “to protect one's reputation” or possibly “vouched for by one's reputation”. A familiar example is in Psalm 23:3.
Webster’s 1913
- noun One that has the same name as another; especially, one called after, or named out of regard to, another.
Etymology [For name's sake; i. e., one named for the sake of another's name.]
Sources: Wiktionary · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “namesake”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details