Dictionary

simile en · NOUN

Pronunciation

• /ˈsəməli/ (New-Zealand)
• /ˈsɪməle/ (Scotland)
• /ˈsɪməli/ (Australia, Canada, General-American, Received-Pronunciation)
• /-lɪ/ (Scotland)
• (California) audio
• /-li/ (Scotland)

Etymology

From Latin simile (“comparison, likeness, parallel”) (first attested 1393), originally from simile, neuter form of similis (“like, similar, resembling”). Compare English similar.

Meanings

1. (countable, rhetoric, uncountable) A figure of speech in which one thing is explicitly compared to another, using e.g. like or as.
   • My father is a quiet man / With sober, steady ways; / For simile, a folded fan; / His nights are like his days. 1925, Countee Cullen, Fruit of the Flower:
   • What follows should be prefaced with some simile—the simile of a powder-mine, a thunderbolt, an earthquake—for it blew Philip up in the air and flattened him on the ground and swallowed him up in the depths. 1905, E[dward] M[organ] Forster, chapter 2, in Where Angels Fear to Tread, Edinburgh; London: William Blackwood and Sons, →OCLC, page 57:
   • He made a simile of George the third to Nebuchadnezzar, and of the prince regent to Belshazzar, and insisted that the prince represented the latter in not paying much attention to what had happened to kings […] 1826, Thomas Bayly Howell, A Complete Collection of State Trials and Proceedings for High Treason and Other Crimes and Misdemeanours, volume 33:
   • The second was a fancy, which amounts to a mania, for similes, strung together in endless lists, and derived as a rule from animals, vegetables, or minerals, especially from the Fauna and Flora of fancy. 1887, George Saintsbury, “Early Elizabethan prose”, in A History of Elizabethan Literature:
2. (countable, uncountable) Similarity or resemblance to something else; likeness, similitude.
3. (countable, uncountable) Something similar that's not a clone.

Forms

Antonyms

dissimile

Coordinates

metaphor · analogy

Deriveds

Homeric simile

Hypernyms

figure of speech

Relateds

metaphor

Translations (61)

da lignelse (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · is líking (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · uk порі́вняння (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · it similitudine (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · pl porównanie (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · hi उपमा (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · cy cymhariaeth (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · sh poredba (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · th อุปมา (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · ca símil (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · cmn 比喻 (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · ro comparație (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · cs přirovnání (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · cmn 譬喻 (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · ja シミレ (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · hu hasonlat (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · ar تَشْبِيه (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · he דִּמּוּי (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · sh usporedba (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · fr comparaison (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · ko 시밀레 (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · az təşbeh (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · sh poređenje (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · fi vertaus (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · ru сравне́ние (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · nb simile (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · ja 直喩 (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · pt símile (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · is samlíking (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · cmn 明喻 (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · sh поредба (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · az bənzətmə (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · de Vergleich (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · el παρομοίωση (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · sh успоредба (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · sh поређење (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · mi kupu whakarite (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · sl primera (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · ja 比喩 (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · be параўна́нне (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · ml ഉപമ (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · sv liknelse (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · sk prirovnanie (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · de Gleichnis (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · ta உவமை (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · uz tashbih (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · got 𐌲𐌰𐌾𐌿𐌺𐍉 (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · ka შედარება (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · nl vergelijking (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · ko 직유 (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · tr teşbih (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · mk споредба (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · vi so sánh (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · cmn 直喻 (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · es símil (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · bg сравне́ние (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · is viðlíking (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · fa تشبیه (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · da sammenligning (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · sa उपमा (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another) · sw tashbihi (figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another)