EPITHET • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Epithet

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/ˈɛpəθˌɛt/ Listen

noun

Epithet n.

An adjective expressing some quality, attribute, or relation, that is properly or specially appropriate to a person or thing; as, a just man; a verdant lawn. "A prince (Henry III.) to whom the epithet "worthless" seems best applicable."

Term; expression; phrase. "Stuffed with epithets of war."

Synonyms: Epithet, Title. The name epithet was formerly extended to nouns which give a title or describe character (as the "epithet of liar"), but is now confined wholly to adjectives. Some rhetoricians, as Whately, restrict it still further, considering the term epithet as belonging only to a limited class of adjectives, viz., those which add nothing to the sense of their noun, but simply hold forth some quality necessarily implied therein; as, the bright sun, the lofty heavens, etc. But this restriction does not prevail in general literature. Epithet is sometimes confounded with application, which is always a noun or its equivalent.

verb

Epithet v. t. To describe by an epithet. (R.) "Never was a town better epitheted."

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Etymology of 'Epithet'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Epithet" Quotes from Famous Books

... rogue," announced the captain, with a suggestion of challenge in the speech, as if he would like to have the epithet resented. But the man only regarded the officer with ...

— Janice Meredith • Paul Leicester Ford

... by an antisyndicate manager. Both concerns catered to the same class of trade, and when either of the partners of Klinger & Klein referred in conversation to a member of the firm of Kleiman & Elenbogen, or vice versa, "sucker" was the mildest epithet employed. ...

— Abe and Mawruss - Being Further Adventures of Potash and Perlmutter • Montague Glass

... reciprocal recognition of their deities by the nations in the midst of whom the Israelites lived, is sufficiently evident from the circumstance, that they all called their highest deity by the same name—Baal—and expressed, by some epithet, only the form of manifestation peculiar to each. Now, the Israelites imagined that they might be able, at one and the same time, to satisfy the demands of their God, and to propitiate [Pg 177] the idols of the neighbouring mighty nations—especially of the Ph[oe]nicians—if ...

— Christology of the Old Testament: And a Commentary on the Messianic Predictions, v. 1 • Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg

... (ten minutes ago she would not have added the epithet), 'you won't stay out and sit up ...

— The Talking Horse - And Other Tales • F. Anstey

... white teeth in an amused smile, and began "Once upon a time our Lord was going through a town with his disciples. A dead dog lay by the wayside, and every one that passed along flung some offensive epithet at him. Eastern dogs are not like our dogs, and seemingly there was nothing good about this loathsome creature, but as our Saviour went by, he said, gently, 'Pearls cannot equal the whiteness ...

— Beautiful Joe • Marshall Saunders

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