Dictionary

semantogram en · NOUN

Pronunciation

• /səˈmæn.tə.ɡɹæm/ weak vowel merger
• (Southern-England) audio
• /sɪˈmæn.tə.ɡɹæm/

Etymology

From semanto- + -gram, thus literally "meaning-drawing."

Meanings

1. A symbol used solely for meaning, as when logographic Chinese symbols are used to represent the meaning of native Japanese words.
   • One could write OJ namyi ‘wave’ with the sinograph for a Chinese morpheme of similar meaning: 波 EMC *pa ‘wave.’ 波 *pa ‘wave’ would then be a semantogram for OJ namyi, serving as a translation of OJ namyi without representing its sound. 2003, Marc Hideo Miyake, Old Japanese: A Phonetic Reconstruction, →ISBN:
   • "the majority of Jurchen signs, which included both semantograms and phonograms, were inventions." 1978, Herbert Franke, Dennis Twitchett, “Introduction”, in The Cambridge History of China, →ISBN, page 32:

Forms

Relateds

logogram · phonogram

Synonyms

ideograph · semantograph