homograph

See also: Homograph

English

WOTD – 14 October 2007

Etymology

From homo- +‎ -graph.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈhɒməɡɹɑːf/, /ˈhəʊməɡɹæf/
• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈhɑːməɡɹæf/, /ˈhoʊməɡɹæf/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Audio (General Australian):

  (file)

Noun

Examples
bear (“mammal”) and bear (“to support”)

homograph (plural homographs)

1. A word that is spelled the same as another word, usually having a different etymology.

   Hypernym: homonym (broad sense)

   Coordinate term: homophone (can be coinstantial)

2. (computing) A text character or string that looks identical to another when rendered.

   Hyponym: homoglyph

Usage notes

Homographs are a kind of homonym in the loose sense of that term, i.e. a word that is either a homophone (same sound) or a homograph (same spelling). (The strict sense of homonym is a word that both sounds and is spelled the same as another word.) Specifically, homographs must have the same spelling, though they usually have different meanings and may be pronounced differently.

• The verb bear (“to carry”) and the noun bear (“large omnivorous mammal”) are homographs with the same pronunciation and different etymological origins.
• The verb alternate (“to go back and forth”) and the adjective alternate (“following by turns”) are homographs with different pronunciations but close etymological origins. Such homographs are also heteronyms.
• The verb meet (“to encounter”) and the noun meat (“food”) are not homographs since they have different spellings.

Derived terms

• homographic
• homographous

 

Related terms

• allograph
• autograph
• homeograph
• homoglyph
• homographic
• homography
• isograph

 

Translations

word with the same spelling but different meaning

• Bulgarian: омогра́ф (bg) m (omográf)
• Catalan: homògraf (ca) m
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 同音異義詞／同音异义词 (tóngyīn yìyì), 同音詞／同音词 (zh) (tóngyīncí), 異讀詞／异读词 (zh) (yìdúcí), 同形詞／同形词 (zh) (tóngxíngcí), (of Chinese characters:) 多音字 (zh) (duōyīnzì), 同形異義字／同形异义字 (tóngxíngyìyìzì), 同形字 (tóngxíngzì)

• Czech: homograf m
• Dutch: homograaf (nl) m
• Finnish: homografi
• French: homographe (fr) m
• German: Homograph (de) m
• Greek: ομοιογράφος (el) m (omoiográfos)
• Hebrew: הומוגרף (he) m (homográf)
• Hungarian: homográf
• Irish: homagraf m
• Japanese: 同音異義語 (ja) (dōon igigo), 同音語 (ja) (dōongo)
• Khmer: កល្បលេខន៍ (kal lekh)
• Kurdish:

  Northern Kurdish: hevnivîs (ku)

• Polish: homograf m
• Portuguese: homógrafo (pt) m
• Russian: омо́граф (ru) m (omógraf), омо́ним (ru) m (omónim)
• Serbo-Croatian: homograf (sh) m, istopisnica (sh) f
• Slovene: enakopisnica f, homograf m
• Spanish: homógrafo (es) m
• Swedish: homograf (sv) c
• Thai: คำพ้องรูป (th) (kam-pɔ́ɔng-rûup)
• Turkish: eş sesli (tr)

See also

• polyphone
• capitonym

Euler diagram of choice semantic relations.

Nyms (with category [cat] if any)

Noun (cat)	Sound	Spelling	Meaning	phone/graph
identical	same	same	same	homophone & homograph
homophone (cat)	same	different	different	homophone & heterograph
alternative spelling	same	different	same	homophone & heterograph
homonym	same	same	different	homophone & homograph
synonym	different	different	same	heterophone & heterograph
heteronym (cat)	different	same	different	heterophone & homograph
alternative pronunciation	different	same	same	heterophone & homograph
distinct	different	different	different	heterophone & heterograph

Further reading

• homograph on Wikipedia.Wikipedia