simile

Etymology

From Latin simile (“comparison, likeness, parallel”) (first attested 1393), originally from simile, neuter form of similis (“like, similar, resembling”). Compare English similar.

noun

  1. A figure of speech in which one thing is explicitly compared to another, using e.g. like or as.
    Coordinate term: (when the comparison is implicit) metaphor
    He made a simile of George the third to Nebuchadnezzar, and of the prince regent to Belshazzar, and insisted that the prince represented the latter in not paying much attention to what had happened to kings […] 1826, Thomas Bayly Howell, A Complete Collection of State Trials and Proceedings for High Treason and Other Crimes and Misdemeanours, volume 33
    My father is a quiet man / With sober, steady ways; / For simile, a folded fan; / His nights are like his days. 1925, Countee Cullen, Fruit of the Flower

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