Explanation
A lexeme is the abstract lexical unit underlying its different grammatical word forms. “Go,” “went,” and “gone” are ordinarily assigned to the same lexeme GO although their spoken and written shapes differ substantially. The lexeme gathers stable lexical identity without being identical to one occurrence or merely to a character string. Its boundaries can become difficult with multiword expressions, homonymy, suppletion, and productive formation. The concept reveals a central abstraction in linguistic description: different material forms are recognised as realisations of one vocabulary item and thereby become grammatically and semantically comparable.
Movement of thought
1. Several concrete word forms first appear with different endings, pronunciations, or spellings. 2. Linguistic knowledge recognises shared lexical meaning and systematic grammatical relations among them. 3. The forms are assigned to an abstract unit serving as an object of dictionaries and analysis. 4. A counter-test examines homonymy, semantic distance, suppletion, and boundaries of multiword expressions. 5. The diversity of word forms returns as the paradigm of one shared but materially non-isolated lexeme.
Scientific use case
Lexicology and computational linguistics use lemmatisation, paradigms, and sense distinction to identify lexemes. Corpus analyses measure frequency and distribution independently of individual inflected forms.
Example
A corpus contains “writes,” “wrote,” and “written.” Lexical search assigns them to the lexeme WRITE while preserving their grammatical differences for analysis.
Counterexample
Two identically written forms need not instantiate one lexeme, as the distinct meanings of English “bank” show. Conversely, very different forms such as “go” and “went” may belong together.
Distinction
Distinguish lexeme from word form, lemma, morpheme, token, and sense. A lexeme is the abstract lexical unit, while a lemma is its conventional citation or dictionary form.
Effect on thought and perception
The lexeme gathers formal variation into lexical identity, enables dictionaries and comparison, and may also conceal difficult boundaries between meanings.
Resonance
Different word forms answer to a shared lexical configuration; through their variation, a recognisable semantic core continues to sound.
Cite this entry
Reich, Michael (Hrsg./ed.): „Lexeme“. Atlas der Sprache, AT-091-030. ATLAS 260, data model 1.6.0. https://atlasoflanguage.com/concept/AT-091-030The address remains stable; editorial content may evolve. Editorial reading state: 2026-10-15. Include your access date for precise references.
Historical background
The Cours contrasts the finite declensional paradigm of dominus with more open associative series. The French passage witnesses organisation among related forms rather than the modern term lexeme. It precedes questions about distinguishing a lexical unit from its inflections and its derivational neighbours.
How conceptual history changes the analysis
Do not count every inflection as a separate lexical item. Nor should every derivational relative be merged into one lexeme.
References for the historical section
- Ferdinand de Saussure, Cours de linguistique générale (1916), edited by Bally and Sechehaye with Riedlinger; 1971 Payot printing, Wikisource transcription · Part II, V §3: associative series and the dominus paradigm
Selected passage, not a complete genealogy or an English first-attestation claim. Original Atlas applications are editorial interpretations, not reported experiments. The Cours is a posthumous editorial reconstruction; French technical vocabulary is not an English attestation. Its historical phonology and classifications are not automatically current consensus.