image definition

English image definition

Etymology

From Middle English ymage, borrowed from Old French image, from Latin imāgō (“a copy, likeness, image”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₂eym-; the same PIE root is the source of imitari (“to copy, imitate”); see imitate. Displaced native Old English biliþe (“an image, a representation, resemblance, likeness; pattern, example”). Doublet of imago.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈɪmɪd͡ʒ/
• Rhymes: -ɪmɪdʒ
• Hyphenation: im‧age

• Audio (US)

  (file)

Noun

image (plural images)

1. An optical or other representation of a real object; a graphic; a picture.

   The Bible forbids the worship of graven images.

   • 1577, Raphaell Holinshed, “[The Historie of Irelande […].] The Thirde Booke of the Historie of Ireland, Comprising the Raigne of Henry the Eyght: [...].”, in The Firste Volume of the Chronicles of England, Scotlande, and Irelande […], volume I, London: […] [Henry Bynneman] for Iohn Hunne, →OCLC, pages 77–78, column 2:

     The Citizens in their rage, imagining that euery poſt in the Churche had bin one of y^e Souldyers, ſhot habbe or nabbe at randon^{[sic – meaning random]} uppe to the Roode lofte, and to the Chancell, leauing ſome of theyr arrowes ſticking in the Images.

   • 2012 March, Brian Hayes, “Pixels or Perish”, in American Scientist‎^[1], volume 100, number 2, archived from the original on 19 February 2013, page 106:

     Drawings and pictures are more than mere ornaments in scientific discourse. Blackboard sketches, geological maps, diagrams of molecular structure, astronomical photographs, MRI images, the many varieties of statistical charts and graphs: These pictorial devices are indispensable tools for presenting evidence, for explaining a theory, for telling a story.

2. A mental picture of something not real or not present.
   • 2013 August 3, “Revenge of the nerds”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8847:

     Think of banking today and the image is of grey-suited men in towering skyscrapers. Its future, however, is being shaped in converted warehouses and funky offices in San Francisco, New York and London, where bright young things in jeans and T-shirts huddle around laptops, sipping lattes or munching on free food.

3. A statue or idol.
4. (computing) A file that contains all information needed to produce a live working copy. (See disk image and image copy.)

   Most game console emulators do not come with any ROM images for copyright reasons.

5. A characteristic of a person, group or company etc., style, manner of dress, how one is or wishes to be perceived by others.
6. (mathematics) What a function maps to.

   The number 6 is the image of 3 under f that is defined as f(x) = 2x.

7. (mathematics) The subset of a codomain comprising those elements that are images of something.

   The image of this step function is the set of integers.

8. (radio) A form of interference: a weaker "copy" of a strong signal that occurs at a different frequency.
9. (obsolete) Show; appearance; cast.
   • 1697, Virgil, “(please specify the book number)”, in John Dryden, transl., The Works of Virgil: Containing His Pastorals, Georgics, and Æneis. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC:

     The face of things a frightful image bears.

Synonyms

• (representation): picture
• (mental picture): idea
• (something mapped to): value
• (subset of the codomain): range

Hyponyms

Derived terms

Related terms

Descendants

• German: Image
• Slovak: imidž
• Russian: и́мидж (ímidž)
  • Armenian: իմիջ (imiǰ)

Translations

Verb

image (third-person singular simple present images, present participle imaging, simple past and past participle imaged)

1. (transitive) To represent by an image or symbol; to portray.
   • 1718, Alexander Pope, The Iliad of Homer, London: Bernard Lintot, Volume IV, Observations on the Fifteenth Book, Note 14 on verse 252, p. 215,^[2]

     This Representation of the Terrors which must have attended the Conflict of two such mighty Powers as Jupiter and Neptune, whereby the Elements had been mix’d in Confusion, and the whole Frame of Nature endangered, is imaged in these few Lines with a Nobleness suitable to the Occasion.

   • 1791, James Boswell, “(please specify the year)”, in The Life of Samuel Johnson, LL.D. […], volume I, London: […] Henry Baldwin, for Charles Dilly, […], →OCLC, page 393:

     […] his behaviour was, as I had imaged to myself, solemnly devout.

   • 1817 (date written), [Jane Austen], chapter XI, in Persuasion; published in Northanger Abbey: And Persuasion. […], volumes (please specify |volume=III or IV), London: John Murray, […], 20 December 1817 (indicated as 1818), →OCLC:

     […] he repeated, with such tremulous feeling, the various lines which imaged a broken heart, or a mind destroyed by wretchedness, and looked so entirely as if he meant to be understood, that she ventured to hope he did not always read only poetry, and to say, that she thought it was the misfortune of poetry to be seldom safely enjoyed by those who enjoyed it completely […]

   • 1850, Nathaniel Hawthorne, chapter 16, in The Scarlet Letter, a Romance, Boston, Mass.: Ticknor, Reed, and Fields, →OCLC, page 222:

     [The road] straggled onward into the mystery of a primeval forest. This hemmed it in so narrowly, and stood so black and dense on either side, and disclosed such imperfect glimpses of the sky above, that, to Hester’s mind, it imaged not amiss the moral wilderness in which she had so long been wandering.

   • 2000, Mary Ann Schwartz, BarBara Marliene Scott, Madine M. L. Vanderplaat, Sociology: Making Sense of the Social World, page 51:

     For example, in one use of content analysis, U.S. researchers Victoria Holden, William Holden, and Gary Davis (1997) examined the growing controversy over the racial imaging of indigenous peoples symbolized in sports team nicknames […]

2. (transitive) To reflect, mirror.
   • 1829, Alfred, Lord Tennyson, “Timbuctoo”, in The Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson‎^[3], volume I, London: J.M. Dent & Sons, published 1906, page 10:

     See’st thou yon river, whose translucent wave,
     Forth issuing from the darkness, windeth through
     The argent streets o’ th’ City, imaging
     The soft inversion of her tremulous Domes,

   • 1840 April – 1841 November, Charles Dickens, “Chapter the Seventy-first”, in The Old Curiosity Shop. A Tale. […], volume II, London: Chapman and Hall, […], published 1841, →OCLC, page 210:

     Sorrow was dead indeed in her, but peace and perfect happiness were born; imaged in her tranquil beauty and profound repose.

   • 1843 April, Thomas Carlyle, “2, “St. Edmundsbury,””, in Past and Present, American edition, Boston, Mass.: Charles C[offin] Little and James Brown, published 1843, →OCLC, book II (The Ancient Monk), page 43:

     […] we look into a pair of eyes deep as our own, imaging our own, but all unconscious of us; to whom we, for the time, are become as spirits and invisible!

3. (transitive) To create an image of.
   • 2013 July-August, Fenella Saunders, “Tiny Lenses See the Big Picture”, in American Scientist:

     The single-imaging optic of the mammalian eye offers some distinct visual advantages. Such lenses can take in photons from a wide range of angles, increasing light sensitivity. They also have high spatial resolution, resolving incoming images in minute detail.

4. (transitive, computing) To create a complete backup copy of a file system or other entity.

Translations

References

• “image”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
• image in Keywords for Today: A 21st Century Vocabulary, edited by The Keywords Project, Colin MacCabe, Holly Yanacek, 2018.
• "image" in Raymond Williams, Keywords (revised), 1983, Fontana Press, page 158.
• “image”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
• “image”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.

Further reading

• image on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Anagrams

• Megia, gamie

Dutch image definition

Etymology

Borrowed from English image.

Pronunciation

• Audio

  (file)

• Hyphenation: ima‧ge

Noun

image n (plural images)

1. image (characteristic perceived by others)

Synonyms

• imago

French image definition

Etymology

Inherited from Old French image, borrowed from Latin imaginem (“a copy, likeness, image”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /i.maʒ/

• Audio (France, Paris)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -aʒ
• Homophones: images, imagent
• Hyphenation: image

Noun

image f (plural images)

1. picture, image
2. (television, film) frame
3. A mental representation.

Synonyms

• métaphore
• reflet
• symbole
• vision

Derived terms

Related terms

• imager
• imagerie
• imaginer

Descendants

• → Turkish: imaj

Verb

image

1. inflection of imager:
   1. first/third-person singular present indicative/subjunctive
   2. second-person singular imperative

Further reading

• “image”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

Anagrams

• magie

Middle English image definition

Noun

image

1. Alternative form of ymage

Norwegian Bokmål image definition

Etymology

Borrowed from English image.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɪmɪdʂ/
• Rhymes: -ɪdʂ

Noun

image m or n (definite singular imagen or imageet, indefinite plural imager or image, definite plural imagene or imagea or imageene)

1. image (how one wishes to be perceived by others)

Norwegian Nynorsk image definition

Etymology

Borrowed from English image.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɪmɪdʂ/
• Rhymes: -ɪdʂ

Noun

image m or n (definite singular imagen or imaget, indefinite plural imagar or image, definite plural imagane or imaga)

1. image (how one wishes to be perceived by others)

Old French image definition

Alternative forms

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin imāgō, imāginem.

Noun

image f (oblique plural images, nominative singular image, nominative plural images)

1. sight (something which one sees)
2. image (pictorial representation)
3. image (mental or imagined representation)
4. image (likeness)
5. statue (of a person)

Descendants

• → English: image
• French: image

References

• Godefroy, Frédéric, Dictionnaire de l’ancienne langue française et de tous ses dialectes du IX^e au XV^e siècle (1881) (image, supplement)