personage

American  

[pur-suh-nij] / ˈpɜr sə nɪdʒ /

noun

1. a person of distinction or importance.

2. any person.

3. a character in a play, story, etc.

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personage British  

/ ˈpɜːsənɪdʒ /

noun

1. an important or distinguished person

2. another word for person

   a strange personage

3. rare a figure in literature, history, etc

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Related Words

See person.

Other Word Forms

• nonpersonage noun

Etymology

Origin of personage

First recorded in 1425–75; late Middle English: “body or image (statue, portrait) of a person” (from Old French ), from Medieval Latin persōnāgium. See person, -age

Example Sentences

And always there is Mama, who haunted her life and haunts her memoir, though Ms. Minnelli wants it understood that she’s her own personage.

From The Wall Street Journal

Stanton is a huge and consequential personage in American history, but she has dwindled in the eyes of posterity to become a subordinate of Anthony.

From The Wall Street Journal

He continues to use it because he finds that “a fictional personage does exert a slightly disinhibiting effect” on his writing—“always in the service of truth, of course.”

From The Wall Street Journal

This deeply researched study examines how AI systems create “abstract people”: statistical confections, subject profiles and anthropomorphic personages that increasingly substitute for humans in digital environments.

From Los Angeles Times

Musk is a unique personage in the CEO ranks, as the Yale researchers observe — “the world’s wealthiest person and CEO of the most valuable automaker by market capitalization.”

From Los Angeles Times

Related Words

• celebrity
• dignitary