Sources of homonyms

There are several sources of homonyms:

a) phonetic changes which words undergo in the course of their historical development. As a result of such changes, two or more words which were formerly pronounced differently may develop identical sound forms and thus become homonyms (e.g. night and knight were not homonyms in Old English as the initial k in the second word was pronounced, and not dropped as it is in its modern sound form: OE. kniht (cf OE nihi). A more complicated change of form brought together another pair of homonyms: to knead (OE cnēdan) and to need (OE nēodian);

b) conversion which serves the creating of grammatical homonyms (e.g. iron →to iron, work→ to work, etc.);

c) shortening is a further type of word-building which increases the number of homonyms (e.g. fan, n. in the sense of "an enthusiastic admirer of some kind of sport or of an actor, singer" is a shortening produced from fanatic. Its homonym is a Latin borrowing fan. n. which denotes an implement for waving lightly to produce a cool current of air. The noun rep, n. denoting a kind of fabric has three homonyms made by shortening: repertory → rep, n., representative → rep, n., reputation → rep, n.);

d) borrowing is another source of homonyms. A borrowed word may, in the final stage of its phonetic adaptation, duplicate in form either a native word or another borrowing (e.g. ritus Lat. → rite n. – write v. – right adj.; pais OFr → piece, n. – pettia OFr → peace n.);

e) words made by sound-imitation can also form pairs of homonyms with other words (e.g. bang, n. "a loud, sudden, explosive noise" – bang, n. "a fringe of hair combed over the forehead"; mew, n. "the sound a cat makes" – mew, n. "a sea gul" – mew, n. "a pen in which poultry is fattened" – mews "small terraced houses in Central London").

One of the most debatable points in semasiology is the demarcation line between homonymy and polysemy, i.e. between different meanings of one word and the meanings of two or more homonymous words. Scientists use different criteria to distinguish between polysemy and homonymy.

1. Semantic criterion. It is usually held that if a connection between various meanings is apprehended by the speaker, they are to be considered as making up the semantic structure of a polysemantic word, otherwise it is a case of homonymy. This traditional criterion implying that the difference is reduced to the difference between related and unrelated meanings is not reliable due to its subjectivity and to the fact that it cannot be applied to a large group of Modern English words made as a result of conversion.

2. The criterion of distribution. It is helpful in cases of lexico-grammatical homonyms (e.g. the homonymic pair paper n. – paper v.) but it fails in case of lexical polysemy.

3. The criterion of spelling. Homonyms differing in graphic forms such as flower-flour are easily perceived to be two different lexical units but there are numerous exceptions to the validity of the present criterion. That is why it is lexicographers’ duty to define the boundaries of each word, i.e. to differentiate homonyms and to unite lexico-grammatical variants deciding on the nature of the object analyzed.

From the viewpoint of their origin homonyms are sometimes divided into historical and etymological.

Historical homonyms are those which result from the breaking up of polysemy; then one polysemantic word will split up into two or more separate words (e.g. to bear (терпіти) – to bear (народити); pupil (учень) – pupil (зіниця)).

Etymological homonyms are words of different origin which come to be alike in sound or in spelling (and may be both written and pronounced alike).

4.2. Semantic groups of words. Synonyms and antonyms. Attempts to study the inner structure of the vocabulary have revealed that in spite of its heterogeneity the English word stock may be analyzed into numerous sub-systems whose members have some features in common, thus distinguishing them from the members of other subsystems.

Words can be classified in many ways. One way of semantic classifying is based on the semantic similarity (or polarity) of words or their component morphemes. The terms usually used to denote these two types of semantic relatedness are synonymy and antonymy.

Synonyms are traditionally described as words different in sound-form but identical or similar in meaning. This definition has been severely criticized on the following points: 1) it cannot be applied to polysemantic words (e.g. the verb to look is usually regarded as a synonym of to watch, to observe, etc. but in its other meanings it is not synonymous with this group but rather with the verbs to seem, to appear); 2) it is hardly possible to speak of similarity of lexical meaning as a whole as it is only the denotational component that may be described as similar (e.g. to die and to pass away are considered synonymous, but the stylistic reference is completely different); 3) it is impossible to speak of identity in meaning as a criterion of synonymity since identity of meaning is very rare even among monosemantic words.

In this connection there has appeared a modified definition of synonyms by I.V. Arnold: synonyms are two or more words of the same language, belonging to the same part of speech and possessing one or more identical or nearly identical denotational meanings, interchangeable, at least in some contexts, without any considerable alteration in denotational meaning, but differing morphemic composition, phonemic shape, shades of meaning, connotations, affective value, valency and idiomatic use.

The duality of synonyms is, probably, their most confusing feature: they are somewhat the same, and yet they are most obviously different. Synonyms add precision to each detail of description and the correct choice of a word from a group of synonyms may color the whole text. They are one of the language's most important expressive means. The principal function of synonyms is to represent the same phenomenon in different aspects, shades and variations. A carefully chosen word from a group of synonyms is a great asset both on the printed page and in a speaker's utterance. It was Mark Twain who said that the difference between the right word and just the right word is the difference between the lightning and the lightning-bug.

Thus, synonymy is the coincidence in the essential meaning of words which usually preserve their differences in connotations and stylistic characteristics.

The synonymic dominant is the most general term potentially containing the spe­cific features rendered by all the other members of the group. The words face, visage, countenance have a common denotational meaning – the front of the head which makes them close synonyms. Face is the dominant, the most general word; countenance is the same part of the head with the reference to the expression it bears; visage is a formal word, chiefly literary, for face or countenance.

The semantic structure of a synonymic dominant is quite simple: it consists only of denotative component and it has no connotations. All (or, at least, most) synonymic groups have a "central" word of this kind whose meaning is equal to the denotation common to the entire synonymic group (e.g. to surprise — to astonish — to amaze - to astound; to shout - to yell - to bellow - to roar; to shine - to flash - to blaze - to gleam - to glisten - to sparkle - to glitter - to shim­mer — to glimmer).

The dominant synonym expresses the notion common to all synonyms of the group in the most general way, without contributing any additional information as to the manner, intensity, duration or any attending feature of the referent. So, any dominant synonym is a typical basic-vocabulary word. Its meaning, which is broad and generalized, more or less covers the meanings of the rest of the synonyms, so that it may be substituted for any of them.

The characteristic features of the dominant synonym are the following: 1) high frequency of usage; 2) broad combinability (ability to be used in combinations with various classes of words); 3) broad general meaning; 4) lack of connotations.

In a great number of cases the semantic difference between two or more synonyms is supported by the difference in valency ( e.g.the verbs win and gain – both may be used in combination with the noun victory: to win a victory, to gain a victory b ut with the word war only win is possible: to win a war).

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