synonym

Etymology

From Middle English sinonyme, from Latin synōnymum, from Ancient Greek συνώνυμον (sunṓnumon), neuter singular form of συνώνυμος (sunṓnumos, “synonymous”), from σύν (sún, “with”) + ὄνομα (ónoma, “name”); surface analysis, syn- + -onym.

noun

1. (semantics, strictly) A word whose meaning is the same as that of another word.
2. (semantics, loosely) A word or phrase with a meaning that is the same as, or very similar to, another word or phrase.
   “Happy” is a synonym of “glad”.
   The proportion of English words that have an exact synonym is small. 1991, William T. Parry, Edward A. Hacker, Aristotelian Logic
3. (zoology) Any of the formal names for a taxon, including the valid name (i.e. the senior synonym).
4. (taxonomy, botany) Any name for a taxon, usually a validly published, formally accepted one, but often also an unpublished name.
5. (databases) An alternative (often shorter) name defined for an object in a database.
   Synonyms are part of the SQL standard and are used frequently by Oracle DBAs. Note that Oracle includes both private and public synonyms. 2011, Paul Nielsen, Uttam Parui, Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Bible