metaphrase
Americannoun
verb (used with object)
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to translate, especially literally.
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to change the phrasing or literary form of.
noun
verb
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to alter or manipulate the wording of
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to translate literally
Etymology
Origin of metaphrase
First recorded in 1600–10, metaphrase is from the Greek word metáphrasis a paraphrasing, change of phrasing. See meta-, phrase
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
"Translation, therefore," says Dryden, "is not so loose as paraphrase, nor so close as metaphrase."
From Lives of the Poets, Volume 1 by Johnson, Samuel
The way I have taken is not so strait as metaphrase, nor so loose as paraphrase; some things, too, I have omitted, and sometimes have added of my own.
From Discourses on Satire and on Epic Poetry by Dryden, John
His general theory may be stated as an aim at something between the literalness of metaphrase and the looseness of paraphase.
From Among My Books First Series by Lowell, James Russell
But most men, little recking what a small portion of the original they were reading, satisfied themselves with the Anglo French epitome and metaphrase.
From The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night — Volume 01 by Burton, Richard Francis, Sir
All translation, I suppose, may be reduced to these three heads—First, that of metaphrase, or turning an author, word by word, and line by line, from one language into another.
From Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 57, No. 354, April 1845 by Various
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
