onomatopoeia
UK /ˌɒnəˌmætəˈpiːə/ · US /ˌɑnəˌmætəˈpiːə/ noun
Forms onomatopoeias onomatopoeiae onomatopœia onomatopy onomatopeia
- noun (uncountable) The property of a word that sounds like what it represents.
- noun (countable) A word that sounds like what it represents, such as gurgle, stutter, or hiss.
- noun (countable) A word that appropriates a sound for another sensation or a perceived nature, such as thud, beep, or meow; an ideophone, phenomime.
- noun (uncountable, rhetoric) The use of language whose sound imitates that which it names.
Synonyms
onomatope phonomime echoism imitative harmony mimesis phonomimesis sound symbolism
Etymology
Borrowed from Latin onomatopoeïa, from Ancient Greek ὀνοματοποιία (onomatopoiía, “the coining of a word in imitation of a sound”), from ὀνοματοποιέω (onomatopoiéō, “to coin names”), from ὄνομα (ónoma, “name”) + ποιέω (poiéō, “to make, to do, to produce”). By surface analysis, onomato- + -poeia.
Webster’s 1913
Sources: Wiktionary · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “onomatopoeia”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details