IMITATIVE • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Imitative

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/ˈɪmətˌeɪtɪv/ Listen

adjective

Imitative adj.

Inclined to imitate, copy, or follow; imitating; exhibiting some of the qualities or characteristics of a pattern or model; dependent on example; not original; as, man is an imitative being; painting is an imitative art.

Formed after a model, pattern, or original. "This temple, less in form, with equal grace, Was imitative of the first in Thrace."

(Nat. Hist.) Designed to imitate another species of animal, or a plant, or inanimate object, for some useful purpose, such as protection from enemies; having resemblance to something else; as, imitative colors; imitative habits; dendritic and mammillary forms of minerals are imitative.

noun

Imitative n. (Gram.) A verb expressive of imitation or resemblance. (R.)

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Etymology of 'Imitative'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Imitative" Quotes from Famous Books

... probably that in the earlier objective phases of music, even the contemporary audiences were not moved in the sense that we should be moved to-day. The audiences were objective also and their enthusiasm may have been aroused by merely the imitative aspects of music as Avison called them. It is certainly a fact that content and form are more closely linked in music than in any other art. Suppose, however, we imagine the development of melody, counterpoint, harmony, modulation, etc., to be symbolized by a series ...

— Browning's England - A Study in English Influences in Browning • Helen Archibald Clarke

... with Major Cragiemuir, Ah Moy arrived at his place of business in Four-and-a-half Street, a mass of bruises, and with a heart full of hatred for his assailant. Perhaps, after all, the fellow had meant no harm. In his guileless, imitative way he had simply tried to do what he had often seen American young men do. Had he not frequently observed big Policeman Ryan kiss the red-haired widow who kept the lodging-house around on Missouri Avenue? Did not Muggsy Walker—across ...

— The Statesmen Snowbound • Robert Fitzgerald

... literary fashion, the origin is a good deal of an accident. What the milliners of Paris, or the demi-monde of Paris, enjoin our English ladies, is (I suppose) a good deal chance; but as soon as it is decreed, those whom it suits and those whom it does not all wear it. The imitative propensity at once insures uniformity; and 'that horrid thing we wore last year' (as the phrase may go) is soon nowhere to be seen. Just so a literary fashion spreads, though I am far from saying with equal primitive unreasonableness—a ...

— Physics and Politics, or, Thoughts on the application of the principles of "natural selection" and "inheritance" to political society • Walter Bagehot

... a certain imitative melody, but disapproved of the subject itself as low and unworthy of ...

— A Desperate Character and Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev

... are much mortified that they cannot eradicate it from their grounds: but were a handloom on a simple construction, as used by the natives of Java, introduced amongst them, they could soon turn their cotton to good account. An instance of their ingenuity and imitative powers in matting, was a thing perfectly unknown amongst them till Captain Cook introduced it from Anamooka, one of the Friendly Isles: but in that branch of manufacture they now far surpass their original. ...

— Voyage of H.M.S. Pandora - Despatched to Arrest the Mutineers of the 'Bounty' in the - South Seas, 1790-1791 • Edward Edwards

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