polyphony

UK/pəˈlɪfəni/

polyphony noun: musical texture consisting of several independent melodic voices, as opposed to music with just one voice (monophony) or music with one dominant melodic voice accompanied by chords (homophony).

Noun

polyphony (countable and uncountable, plural polyphonies)

Musical texture consisting of several independent melodic voices, as opposed to music with just one voice (monophony) or music with one dominant melodic voice accompanied by chords (homophony).
The quality of a text of being able to be read in more than one way.
- the polyphony of a biblical passage

polyphony meaning in Persian

polyphony in Persian

musical texture consisting of several independent melodic voices: چندصدایی

Forms of polyphony

plural	polyphonies

Origin of polyphony

Learned borrowing from Ancient Greek πολυφωνία (poluphōnía); equivalent to poly- + -phony.

Words formed from polyphony

Questions about polyphony

What does polyphony mean?: Polyphony means musical texture consisting of several independent melodic voices, as opposed to music with just one voice (monophony) or music with one dominant melodic voice accompanied by chords (homophony).
What is polyphony in Persian?: Polyphony in Persian is چندصدایی. See Polyphony meaning in Persian.
What part of speech is polyphony?: Polyphony is a noun.
How do you pronounce polyphony?: Polyphony is pronounced /pəˈlɪfəni/ (UK).
What is the plural of polyphony?: The plural of polyphony is polyphonies.

Words near polyphony in the dictionary

Adapted from Wiktionary: polyphony (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.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-us-polyphony.oga.

Cite this entry: “polyphony.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/polyphony. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.