Explanation
Figura synonymia denotes a rhetorical sequence of expressions that are identical or close in meaning and refer to the same subject. It does not simply repeat the same wording; instead, it approaches a matter through neighbouring designations that may each add a different emphasis. The sequence can intensify, unfold, specify, or emotionally charge a thought. The figure depends on functional proximity in context rather than complete interchangeability of words in every environment. Its historical name overlaps with synonymia and must not be made into an artificial second figure. A separate Atlas profile is useful only insofar as it exposes the figurative use of lexical synonymy and its movement of thought. That movement does not merely circle: it surrounds a subject until its contour emerges from several verbal approaches.
Movement of thought
1. A subject is first named by an expression that opens one particular semantic perspective upon it. 2. Further near-synonyms enter, retaining the same reference point while activating different nuances. 3. The sequence condenses, explains, or intensifies the thought without merely repeating identical wording. 4. A counter-test examines shared reference and rhetorical function, separating the figure from listing, tautology, and arbitrary variation. 5. The subject returns polyphonically; no single name exhausts it, yet their proximity makes it more distinct.
Scientific use case
Rhetoric, stylistics, and corpus linguistics investigate semantic distance, syntactic sequencing, and communicative function. Historical terminology research clarifies the overlap between figura synonymia and synonymia.
Example
“He was tired, exhausted, utterly spent” directs three neighbouring descriptions towards one condition and intensifies it from ordinary fatigue to complete depletion.
Counterexample
“The room contained a table, two chairs, and a shelf” lists different objects. The expressions neither unfold one shared referent nor create synonymous intensification, so this is not synonymia.
Distinction
Historically and substantively near-identical with synonymia; distinguish it from lexical synonymy, congeries, auxesis, tautology, pleonasm, enumeratio, and verbal variation alone.
Effect on thought and perception
The figure increases emphasis and vividness, makes semantic nuances audible beside one another, and can both specify a claim and load it affectively.
Resonance
Several words gather around the same subject and illuminate it from slightly displaced angles; their proximity produces a contour that none would have drawn alone.
Cite this entry
Reich, Michael (Hrsg./ed.): „Synonymia“. Atlas der Sprache, AT-RES6B-0004. ATLAS 260, data model 1.6.0. https://atlasoflanguage.com/concept/AT-RES6B-0004The address remains stable; editorial content may evolve. Editorial reading state: 2026-10-15. Include your access date for precise references.
Historical background
On page 324 of his 1898 handbook, Bullinger separates similarity of word meanings from the figure produced by emphatic accumulation. Different sound and origin can coexist with related meanings, and their repetition intensifies a passage. This witnesses the rhetorical category; it establishes neither complete semantic identity nor an independent history of the German label Figura synonymia.
How conceptual history changes the analysis
The figure requires an account of what the accumulation does, alongside lexical similarity.