legend

[lej-uhnd]

noun

1. a nonhistorical or unverifiable story handed down by tradition from earlier times and popularly accepted as historical.

   Antonyms: fact

2. the body of stories of this kind, especially as they relate to a particular people, group, or clan.

   the winning of the West in American legend.

3. an inscription, especially on a coat of arms, on a monument, under a picture, or the like.

4. a table on a map, chart, or the like, listing and explaining the symbols used.

5. Numismatics.,  inscription.

6. a collection of stories about an admirable person.

7. a person who is the center of such stories.

   She became a legend in her own lifetime.

8. Archaic.,  a story of the life of a saint, especially one stressing the miraculous or unrecorded deeds of the saint.

9. Obsolete.,  a collection of such stories or stories like them.

legend

/ ˈlɛdʒənd /

noun

1. a popular story handed down from earlier times whose truth has not been ascertained

2. a group of such stories

   the Arthurian legend

3. a modern story that has taken on the characteristics of a traditional legendary tale

4. a person whose fame or notoriety makes him a source of exaggerated or romanticized tales or exploits

5. an inscription or title, as on a coin or beneath a coat of arms

6. explanatory matter accompanying a table, map, chart, etc

7. 1. a story of the life of a saint

   2. a collection of such stories

Other Word Forms

• prelegend noun
• legendry noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of legend¹

First recorded in 1300–50; 1900–05 legend for def. 4; Middle English legende “written account of a saint's life,” from Medieval Latin legenda literally, “(lesson) to be read,” noun use of feminine of Latin legendus, gerund of legere “to read”; so called because appointed to be read on respective saints' days

Word History and Origins

Origin of legend¹

C14 (in the sense: a saint's life or a collection of saints' lives): from Medieval Latin legenda passages to be read, from Latin legere to read

Synonym Study

Legend, fable, myth refer to fictitious stories, usually handed down by tradition (although some fables are modern). Legend, originally denoting a story concerning the life of a saint, is applied to any fictitious story, sometimes involving the supernatural, and usually concerned with a real person, place, or other subject: the legend of the Holy Grail. A fable is specifically a fictitious story (often with animals or inanimate things as speakers or actors) designed to teach a moral: a fable about industrious bees. A myth is one of a class of stories, usually concerning gods, semidivine heroes, etc., current since primitive times, the purpose of which is to attempt to explain some belief or natural phenomenon: the Greek myth about Demeter.

Example Sentences

This city may be small, but in 1926 it became immortal, the place where a fiesta, thundering hooves, and a novel collided to shape modern legend.

Read more on Salon

If you don't perform every week, you are going to hear a lot of things from club legends, from pundits, from the media - and sometimes they are right.

Read more on BBC

His name has now joined the realm of October legends.

Read more on Los Angeles Times

“Fred Durst’s a legend, but it would have been a completely different story. It’s like the universe gave me a day to make two years’ headway in my career.”

Read more on Los Angeles Times

Rock legends Guns N' Roses are currently in the middle of a world tour, and recently appeared at Ozzy Osbourne's final live show in his hometown of Birmingham.

Read more on BBC

Related Words

• fable 
• fiction 
• folklore 
• lore 
• myth 
• mythology 
• tale 
• tradition