| Definition: The capacity for a word or phrase to have multiple meanings. |
| Example: In the sentence Look at the size of those cranes!, the word cranes is polysemous because it could denote either a bird or a gantry. |
| Etymology: The word derives from the Greek polusemos, having many meanings (from poly, many + sema, sign). |
Oxford English Dictionary: Its first OED citation is from 1900: "The new meaning of a word, whatever it may be, does not make an end of the old. They exist alongside of one another…. In proportion as a new signification is given to a word, it appears to multiply and produce fresh examples, similar in form, but differing in value. We shall call this phenomenon of multiplication Polysemia."
(N. Cust tr. Semantics xiv. 140) |