Definition of Catachresis

1. Noun. Strained or paradoxical use of words either in error (as 'blatant' to mean 'flagrant') or deliberately (as in a mixed metaphor: 'blind mouths').

Generic synonyms: Rhetorical Device
Derivative terms: Catachrestic, Catachrestical

Definition of Catachresis

1. n. A figure by which one word is wrongly put for another, or by which a word is wrested from its true signification; as, "To take arms against a sea of troubles". Shak. "Her voice was but the shadow of a sound." Young.

Definition of Catachresis

1. Noun. A misuse of a word; an application of a term to something which it does not properly denote. ¹

2. Noun. (rhetoric) A misapplication or overextension of figurative or analogical description; a wrongly-applied metaphor or trope. ¹

¹ Source: wiktionary.com

Definition of Catachresis

1. [n -CHRESES]

Lexicographical Neighbors of Catachresis

catabolisms
catabolite
catabolite (gene) activator protein
catabolite gene activator
catabolite gene activator protein
catabolite repression
catabolites
catabolize
catabolized
catabolizes
catabolizing
catacaustic
catacaustics
catachism
catachreses
catachresis (current term)
catachrestic
catachrestical
catachrestically
catachronobiology
cataclasm
cataclastic
cataclinal
cataclysm
cataclysmal
cataclysmic
cataclysmically
cataclysmist
cataclysmists
cataclysms

Literary usage of Catachresis

Below you will find example usage of this term as found in modern and/or classical literature:

1. Transactions of the Bibliographical Society by Bibliographical Society (Great Britain) (1903)
"(S) Synecdoche generis, with instances of catachresis, hyperbole, allegoria. Before entering on the detailed treatment of Figures, Butler gives a synopsis ..."

2. Rejected Addresses: Or, The New Theatrum Poetarum by James Smith, Horace Smith (1841)
"This journal was, at the period in question, rather remarkable for the use of the figure called by the rhetoricians catachresis. The Bard of Avon may be ..."

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