image

Etymology

From Middle English, from Old French, from Latin imāgō (“a copy, likeness, image”), from *im. *Im is also root of imitari (“to copy, imitate”); see imitate.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈɪmɪd͡ʒ/
• Rhymes: -ɪmɪdʒ
• Hyphenation: im‧age

• Audio (US)

  (file)

Noun

image (plural images)

1. An optical or other representation of a real object; a graphic; a picture.

   The Bible forbids the worship of graven images.

   • 1577, Raphaell Holinshed [i.e., Raphael Holinshed]; Richard Stanihurst, “[The Historie of Irelande.] The Thirde Booke of the Historie of Ireland, Comprising the Raigne of Henry the Eyght: [...].”, in The Firste Volume of the Chronicles of England, Scotlande, and Irelande. Conteyning, The Description and Chronicles of England, from the First Inhabiting unto the Conquest. The Description and Chronicles of Scotland, from the First Originall of the Scottes Nation, till the Yeare of Our Lorde. 1571. The Description and Chronicles of Yrelande, likewise from the First Originall of that Nation, untill the Yeare. 1547. Faithfully Gathered and Set Forth, volume I, London: Imprinted [by Henry Bynneman] for Iohn Harrison, OCLC 55195564, pages 77–78, column 2:

     The Citizens in their rage, imagining that euery poſt in the Churche had bin one of ye Souldyers, ſhot habbe or nabbe at randon^{[sic, meaning random]} uppe to the Roode lofte, and to the Chancell, leauing ſome of theyr arrowes ſticking in the Images.

   • 2012 March, Brian Hayes, “Pixels or Perish”, in American Scientist‎, volume 100, number 2, page 106:

     Drawings and pictures are more than mere ornaments in scientific discourse. Blackboard sketches, geological maps, diagrams of molecular structure, astronomical photographs, MRI images, the many varieties of statistical charts and graphs: These pictorial devices are indispensable tools for presenting evidence, for explaining a theory, for telling a story.

2. A mental picture of something not real or not present.
   • 2013 August 3, “Revenge of the nerds”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8847:

     Think of banking today and the image is of grey-suited men in towering skyscrapers. Its future, however, is being shaped in converted warehouses and funky offices in San Francisco, New York and London, where bright young things in jeans and T-shirts huddle around laptops, sipping lattes or munching on free food.

3. (computing) A file that contains all information needed to produce a live working copy. (See disk image, executable image and image copy.)

   Most game console emulators do not come with any ROM images for copyright reasons.

4. A characteristic of a person, group or company etc., style, manner of dress, how one is, or wishes to be, perceived by others.
5. (mathematics) Something mapped to by a function.

   The number 6 is the image of 3 under f that is defined as f(x) = 2*x.

6. (mathematics) The subset of a codomain comprising those elements that are images of something.

   The image of this step function is the set of integers.

7. (obsolete) Show; appearance; cast.
   • Dryden

     The face of things a frightful image bears.

Verb

image (third-person singular simple present images, present participle imaging, simple past and past participle imaged)

1. (transitive) To represent by an image or symbol; to portray.
   • 1718, Alexander Pope, The Iliad of Homer, London: Bernard Lintot, Volume IV, Observations on the Fifteenth Book, Note 14 on verse 252, p. 215,

     This Representation of the Terrors which must have attended the Conflict of two such mighty Powers as Jupiter and Neptune, whereby the Elements had been mix’d in Confusion, and the whole Frame of Nature endangered, is imaged in these few Lines with a Nobleness suitable to the Occasion.

   • 1791, James Boswell, The Life of Samuel Johnson, London: Charles Dilly, Volume I, p. 393,

     […] his behaviour was, as I had imaged to myself, solemnly devout.

   • 1817, Jane Austen, Persuasion, Chapter 11,

     […] he repeated, with such tremulous feeling, the various lines which imaged a broken heart, or a mind destroyed by wretchedness, and looked so entirely as if he meant to be understood, that she ventured to hope he did not always read only poetry, and to say, that she thought it was the misfortune of poetry to be seldom safely enjoyed by those who enjoyed it completely […]

   • 1850, Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter, Boston: Ticknor, Reed & Fields, Chapter 16, p. 222,

     [The road] straggled onward into the mystery of a primeval forest. This hemmed it in so narrowly, and stood so black and dense on either side, and disclosed such imperfect glimpses of the sky above, that, to Hester’s mind, it imaged not amiss the moral wilderness in which she had so long been wandering.

2. (transitive) To reflect, mirror.
   • 1829, Alfred, Lord Tennyson, “Timbuctoo” in The Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson, London: J.M. Dent & Sons, 1906, Volume I, p. 10,

     See’st thou yon river, whose translucent wave,

     Forth issuing from the darkness, windeth through

     The argent streets o’ th’ City, imaging

     The soft inversion of her tremulous Domes,

   • 1841, Charles Dickens, The Old Curiosity Shop, London: Chapman & Hall, Chapter 71, p. 210,

     Sorrow was dead indeed in her, but peace and perfect happiness were born; imaged in her tranquil beauty and profound repose.

   • 1843, Thomas Carlyle, Past and Present, London: Chapman & Hall, Book 2, Chapter 2, “St. Edmundsbury,” p. 43,

     […] we look into a pair of eyes deep as our own, imaging our own, but all unconscious of us; to whom we, for the time, are become as spirits and invisible!

3. (transitive) To create an image of.
   • 2013 July-August, Fenella Saunders, “Tiny Lenses See the Big Picture”, in American Scientist:

     The single-imaging optic of the mammalian eye offers some distinct visual advantages. Such lenses can take in photons from a wide range of angles, increasing light sensitivity. They also have high spatial resolution, resolving incoming images in minute detail.

4. (transitive, computing) To create a complete backup copy of a file system or other entity.

References

• image on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Further reading

• image in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913
• image in The Century Dictionary, The Century Co., New York, 1911
• "image" in Raymond Williams, Keywords (revised), 1983, Fontana Press, page 158.

Anagrams

• gamie

Etymology

Borrowed from English image.

Pronunciation

• Audio

  (file)

• Hyphenation: ima‧ge

Noun

image n (plural images)

1. image (characteristic perceived by others)

Etymology

From Latin imago (“a copy, likeness, image”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /i.maʒ/

• Audio (France, Paris)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -aʒ
• Homophones: images, imagent
• Hyphenation: i‧mage

Noun

image f (plural images)

1. picture, image
2. (TV, film) frame

Verb

image

1. first-person singular present indicative of imager
2. third-person singular present indicative of imager
3. first-person singular present subjunctive of imager
4. third-person singular present subjunctive of imager
5. second-person singular imperative of imager

Further reading

• “image” in le Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Anagrams

• magie

Etymology

Borrowed from English image.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɪmɪdʂ/
• Rhymes: -ɪdʂ

Noun

image m, n

1. image (how one wishes to be perceived by others)

Etymology

Borrowed from English image.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɪmɪdʂ/
• Rhymes: -ɪdʂ

Noun

image m, n

1. image (how one wishes to be perceived by others)

Alternative forms

Etymology

Latin imāgō.

Noun

image f (oblique plural images, nominative singular image, nominative plural images)

1. sight (something which one sees)
2. image (pictorial representation)
3. image (mental or imagined representation)
4. image (likeness)
5. statue (of a person)

References

• Godefroy, Frédéric, Dictionnaire de l'ancienne langue française et de tous ses dialectes du IX^e au XV^e siècle (1881) (image, supplement)