metaphor
pronunciation
How to pronounce metaphor in British English:
UK [ˈmetəfə(r)]
How to pronounce metaphor in American English:
US [ˈmetəfər]
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- Noun:
- a figure of speech in which an expression is used to refer to something that it does not literally denote in order to suggest a similarity
Word Origin
- metaphor (n.)
- late 15c., from Middle French metaphore (Old French metafore, 13c.), and directly from Latin metaphora, from Greek metaphora "a transfer," especially of the sense of one word to a different word, literally "a carrying over," from metapherein "transfer, carry over; change, alter; to use a word in a strange sense," from meta- "over, across" (see meta-) + pherein "to carry, bear" (see infer).