epithet
Syllables: ep·i·thet/ˈɛp.ɪˌθɛt/
epithet noun: a term used to characterize a person or thing.
Noun
epithet (plural epithets)
- A term used to characterize a person or thing.
- She would lean her head for hours on Beatrice's shoulder, only now and then applying to her some childish and endearing epithet.1831, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter VII, in Romance and Reality. […], volume III, London: Henry Colburn and Richard Bentley, […], →OCLC, page 130
- A term used as a qualifier of the name of a deity in order to designate said deity in a particular aspect or role.
- Synonyms:
- byname
- A term used as a descriptive substitute for the name or title of a person.
- One of many formulaic words or phrases used in the Iliad and Odyssey to characterize a person, a group of people, or a thing.
- An abusive or contemptuous word or phrase.
- Part of this process was the elaboration of new terms for the Jew, especially the increasingly popular epithet “kike”.2006, Eric L. Goldstein, The Price of Whiteness: Jews, Race, and American Identity
- Counterprotesters shouted epithets as they walked by, but the opposing groups kept it nonviolent.2025 January 15, Linda Feldmann, “Outside the DC jail, where Jan. 6 rage and devotion live on”, in The Christian Science Monitor, archived from the original on 24 Jan 2025
- A word in the scientific name of a taxon following the name of the genus or species. This applies only to formal names of plants, fungi and bacteria. In formal names of animals the corresponding term is the specific name.
Verb
epithet (third-person singular simple present epithets, present participle epitheting, simple past and past participle epitheted)
- To term; to refer to as.
- He was epitheted "the king of fools".
epithet meaning in Tamil, Urdu, Bengali and Malayalam
epithet in Tamil
- term used to characterize a person or thing
- அடைமொழி aṭaimoḻi
- term used as a descriptive substitute for the name or title of a person
- அடைமொழி aṭaimoḻi
- abusive or contemptuous word or phrase
- வன்சொல் vaṉcol
epithet in Urdu
- خطاب, لقب, صفت
epithet in Bengali
- বিশেষণ, উপাধি
epithet in Malayalam
- വർണനാത്മകമായ വിശേഷണപദം
More languagesFewer languages
- epithet in Kannada
- ವಿಶೇಷಣ, ಗುಣವಾಚಕ, ಗುಣವನ್ನು ಹೇಳುವ ಪದ, ಉಪನಾಮ
- epithet in Punjabi
- ਵਿਸ਼ੇਸ਼ਣ viśeśaṇ
- epithet in Sanskrit
- विराज् virā́j
- epithet in Arabic
- صِفَة ṣifa
- epithet in Persian
- صفت sefat, گواسه govâse
Examples of epithet in a sentence
- In the name "Cannabis sativa subsp. indica", the word indica is the infraspecific epithet.
- His testimony at a public hearing was a harbinger of uglier epithets to come.
- On the possible werewolvish significance of the epithet luchthonn, see Kim McCone, ‘Olr.
Synonyms of epithet
Forms of epithet
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | epithets |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | epithets |
| present participle | epitheting |
| past participle | epitheted |
| past | epitheted |
Origin of epithet
From Middle French épithète, from Latin epithetum, epitheton, from Ancient Greek ἐπίθετον (epítheton, “epithet, adjective”), the neuter of ἐπίθετος (epíthetos, “additional”), from ἐπιτίθημι (epitíthēmi, “to add on”), from ἐπι- (epi-, “in addition”) + τίθημι (títhēmi, “to put”) (suf. possibly related to title in the sense of "ascribed appellation") (from Proto-Indo-European *dʰeh₁- (“to put, to do”)). Doublet of epitheton.
Words formed from epithet
Phrases with epithet
Questions about epithet
- What does epithet mean?
- Epithet means a term used to characterize a person or thing.
- What is epithet in Tamil?
- Epithet in Tamil is அடைமொழி (aṭaimoḻi), வன்சொல் (vaṉcol). See Epithet meaning in Tamil.
- What part of speech is epithet?
- Epithet can be a noun or a verb.
- How do you pronounce epithet?
- Epithet is pronounced /ˈɛp.ɪˌθɛt/.
- What is the plural of epithet?
- The plural of epithet is epithets.
Words near epithet in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: epithet (page history and authors); epithet (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); Epithet (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); epithet (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); epithet (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); ਵਿਸ਼ੇਸ਼ਣ (Punjabi) (page history and authors); विराज् (Sanskrit) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-us-epithet.ogg.
Cite this entry: “epithet.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/epithet. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.