Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. A statement conveying fundamental character.
- n. A statement of the meaning of a word, phrase, or term, as in a dictionary entry.
- n. The act or process of stating a precise meaning or significance; formulation of a meaning.
- n. The act of making clear and distinct: a definition of one's intentions.
- n. The state of being closely outlined or determined: "With the drizzle, the trees in the little clearing had lost definition” ( Anthony Hyde).
- n. A determination of outline, extent, or limits: the definition of a President's authority.
- n. The clarity of detail in an optically produced image, such as a photograph, effected by a combination of resolution and contrast.
- n. The degree of clarity with which a televised image or broadcast signal is received.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. The determination of the limits or outlines of a thing; a marking out; the state of being clearly marked out or outlined; specifically, in optics, the defining power of a lens—that is, its ability to give a clear, distinct image of an object in all its important details. This depends upon the freedom of the lens from spherical and chromatic aberration.
- n. The act of stating the signification of a word or phrase, or the essential properties of a thing.
- n. A statement of the signification of a word or phrase, or of what is essential to the conception of any given thing; an explanation of how any given kind is distinguished from all other kinds. Three conceptions of the nature of definition have prevailed at different times: Aristotle taught that every strict definition consists of two parts, different in kind, one declaring the genus or higher class to which the species defined belongs, the other declaring the specific difference by which the given species differs from others of the same genus. This view influences most of the definitions of systematic botany and zoology.
Wiktionary
- n. semantics A statement of the meaning of a word or word group or a sign or symbol (dictionary definitions).
- n. A statement expressing the essential nature of something; formulation
- n. The action or process of defining.
- n. The act of defining; determination of the limits.
- n. A product of defining.
- n. The action or power of describing, explaining, or making definite and clear.
- n. Clarity of visual presentation, distinctness of outline or detail.
- n. Clarity, especially of musical sound in reproduction.
- n. Sharp demarcation of outlines or limits.
- n. bodybuilding The degree to which individual muscles are distinct on the body.
- n. programming A statement which provides a previous delcaration with a value or body of a subroutine (in the case of function).
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. The act of defining; determination of the limits.
- n. Act of ascertaining and explaining the signification; a description of a thing by its properties; an explanation of the meaning of a word or term
- n. rare Description; sort.
- n. (Logic) An exact enunciation of the constituents which make up the logical essence.
- n. (Opt.) Distinctness or clearness, as of an image formed by an optical instrument; precision in detail.
WordNet 3.0
- n. a concise explanation of the meaning of a word or phrase or symbol
- n. clarity of outline
Etymologies
- From Middle English diffinicioun, from Middle French definition, from Latin dēfīnītiō, from dēfīniō. (Wiktionary)
- Middle English diffinicioun, from Old French definition, from Latin dēfīnītiō, dēfīnītiōn-, from dēfīnītus, past participle of dēfīnīre, to define; see define. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“The definition of ˜definition™ for Protothetic run to 18 separate complex clauses, and in Ontology, which adds a second style of definition, another 18 clauses.”
“By that definition, a manifesto is suspect as a *definition* of the community.”
“Apple's definition of the design phase, is that it consists of four sub phases focusing on ... becoming familiar with the device and the context in which it is used, product definition*, design & prototype on paper, polish & refine to develop an application with a fantastic user experience.”
“In order to be an “air pollutant” under the Act’s definition, the “substance or matter being emitted into . . . the ambient air” must also meet the first half of the definition’€”namely, it must be an “air pollution agent or combination of such agents.””
“Love GOD and Love your neighbor (which in definition is anyone believer and not)!”
“The median price differs in definition from the mean home price, which is the average of all home prices.”
“That will get the word definition down in Google search results.”
“Your definition is the number of units of housing that is vacant and available for someone moving to the area to occupy.”
The Volokh Conspiracy » The Further Left You Are the Less You Know About Economics:
“Usually, this definition is associated with children.”
The Huffington Post: Levi Ben-Shmuel: Reclaiming the Wisdom of Innocence
“Contrary to this definition is the grand (delusional) idea that the ICC will bring the law to international relations in general, including the relations between the great powers.”
The Volokh Conspiracy » “Garzon and the Trouble with International Law”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘definition’.
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Visuals
A list of words which yield surprising, beautiful, amusing, or otherwise noteworthy images here on Wordnik.
photochrom, fufluns, thank you, cool l..., postcard, picture postcard, cricket, physiological ill..., Gakuryū Ishii, ametropia, One Froggy Evening, rhodopsin, Santiago Calatrava and 636 more...
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-tion
vacation, suggestion, donation, condition, education, examination, federation, generation, imagination, invention, operation, pollution and 166 more...
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EN - academic vocabulary
Use these and get promoted
abandon, abandonment, abnormally, abstract, abstraction, abstractly, abstracts, academia, academic, academically, academics, academies and 3119 more...
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EU Buzz - Lisbon Treaty
All words of the Lisbon Treaty
(Persons' names, foreign and grammatical words have been eliminated, MWEs have been split up into individual words. Capitalization has been retained if r...conferral, stateless, person, voting, right, subsidiarity, Latvia, Malta, Slovenia, Lithuania, Finland, Estonia and 2614 more...
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Thresholds
we are all just passing through.
(boundaries, portals and liminal spaces/times)cockcrow, interface, thin line, portal, postern, littoral, interstice, port, membrane, skin, crepuscule, dawn and 304 more...
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boundaries / divisions
demarcation, limit, separation, distinction, definition, boundary, division, dichotomy, binary, dualities, categorisation, classification and 23 more...
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• Wordie for dummies!
Our collection of FAQs, help and tips.
I can helping!!!faq, features, bugs, word, diacritics, some html, tags, images, video, promotion, tricks, comments for spec... and 11 more...
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eggplantia5's Words
scintillate, marvel, cranberry, oscillate, triumph, bamboozle, grimace, magical, book, hexagon, cipher, compendium and 2727 more...
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Basic English Vocabulary
Very basic words for ESL students.
a, abandon, ability, able, abortion, about, above, abroad, absence, absolute, absolutely, absorb and 4334 more...
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ESL Academic Word List
This is a list of academic words for students learning English as a Second or Foreign Language. It includes 570 word families that often appear in academic texts. It does not include words that are...
collapse, depression, colleagues, invoked, levy, nonetheless, likewise, so-called, ongoing, conceived, forthcoming, integrity and 558 more...
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Learned words
Words which are highly likely to be found in the work of learned writers.
ailurophile, labyrinthine, lagniappe, colleague, anechoic, reglets, fluctuations, scalar, implicit, constitute, mortification, ambassadors and 629 more...
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nuwerdna's Words
smegma, defenestration, nubile, zeitgeist, stochastic, ergodic, stability, maudlin, recursion, aversion, agent, set and 239 more...
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Twilight_Love_Story's list
My favorite words
methodical, masochistic, nurture, angelic, artistic, melody, animals, peaceful, ambling, definition, musical, choatic and 7 more...
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Word Words
Word-related words.
etymology, language, definition, dictionary, thesaurus, lexicon, lingua franca, linguistics, grammar, syntax, semantics, simile and 19 more...
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words about words
palindrome, syllable, vowel, consonant, alphabet, vocabulary, etymology, Synonym, antonym, anagram, verb, noun and 39 more...
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Meta
Because in this crazy place, technical feedback on site bugs goes on the page for the word 'bugs'. See also Meta Squared, plethora's list of meta lists.
bugs, features, mobile, wordie, wordnet, madeupical, tagging, merch, weirdnet, tag, meta, search and 83 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for definition.

reesetee It is rather amusing at times, once you get used to it, Asativum. :-) Nov 21, 2007
kewpid If only the world were so black and white. Nov 21, 2007
asativum Gotcha. So it either happens or it doesn't. I can rest easy now. Nov 21, 2007
john The nice people at Princeton provide them.
Someday there'll be a way to add definitions to words not covered by the integrated dictionary, or a way to collaboratively promote comments to definition status. Not sure which day, though. I wouldn't hold your breath :-) Nov 21, 2007
asativum So how does one get that nifty definition next to a word? Nov 21, 2007