Search the Dictionary

iation; a figurative representation; a typical designation; a symbol; as, a balance is an emblem of justice; a scepter, the emblem of sovereignty or power; a circle, the emblem of eternity. "His cicatrice, an emblem of war, here on his sinister cheek." Shak.

Pertaining to, containing, or consisting in, an emblem; symbolic; typically representative; representing as an emblem; as, emblematic language or ornaments; a crown is emblematic of royalty; white is emblematic of purity. -- Em`blem*at"ic*al*ly, adv.

To render emblematic; as, to emblematicize a picture. [R.] Walpole.

A writer or inventor of emblems. Sir T. Browne.

To represent by, or as by, an emblem; to symbolize. Anciently the sun was commonly emblematized by a starry or radiate figure. Bp. Hurd.

nted; -- used especially in the plural. The produce of grass, trees, and the like, is not emblement. Wharton's Law Dict.

To represent by an emblem; to emblematize. [R.]

Anything which represents by suggestive resemblance; an emblem.

An emblem of hope.

A tau cross with a loop at the top, used as an attribute or sacred emblem, symbolizing generation or enduring life. Called also crux ansata.

Any single emblem or charge in an escutcheon or coat of arms -- commonly in the pl. A carriage covered with armorial bearings. Thackeray.

in solution, as a substitute for gum in stiffering goods. -- British lion, the national emblem of Great Britain. -- British seas, the four seas which surround Great Britain.

A ceremonial symbols; an emblem, as a crown, scepter, garland, etc. [Obs.] Disrobe the images, If you find them decked with ceremonies. . . . Let no images Be hung with Cæsar's trophies. Shak.

y. The back has usually a large cross, the front an upright bar or pillar, designed to be emblematical of Christ's sufferings. In the Greek Church the chasuble is a large round mantle. [Written also chasible, and chesible.]

g a sac under the beak; the shag. Cormorants devour fish voraciously, and have become the emblem of gluttony. They are generally black, and hence are called sea ravens, and coalgeese. [Written also corvorant.]

The horn of plenty, from which fruits and flowers are represented as issuing. It is an emblem of abundance.

A representation of the increasing moon, often used as an emblem or badge; as:

, and serving as a symbol of death. Crossbones, scythes, hourglasses, and other lugubrios emblems of mortality. Hawthorne.

The pointless sword carried before English monarchs at their coronation, and emblematically considered as the sword of mercy; -- also called the sword of Edward the Confessor.

A naked human skull as the emblem of death; the head of the conventional personification of death. I had rather be married to a death's-head with a bone in his mouth. Shak. Death's-head moth (Zoöl.), a very large European moth (Acherontia atropos), so called from a figure resembling a human skull on the back of the tho…