Literary notes about denominate (AI summary)
The word "denominate" has long been used in literature as a versatile term for labeling or designating qualities, groups, or concepts. For example, in classical rhetoric Cicero employs the term to specify a tyrant as understood by the Greeks [1], while Griffis applies it to characterize a religious group as "Methodists of Buddhism" [2]. In the literary realm, Edgar Allan Poe uses it to elevate a favor to the status of being "priceless" and to describe unusual occurrences [3, 4]. Philosophers and historians, such as Aristotle and Bacon, similarly use "denominate" to designate qualities of appetite or royal titles, respectively [5, 6]. Its usage extends further among scholars and satirists—Durkheim discusses rites [7], Coleridge delineates aspects of the imagination [8], and even a humorous note is struck in Punch where personal shortcomings are labeled [9], with Aesop rounding out the examples by using it to compare forms of wealth [10].
- Here is a specimen of that despot over the people whom the Greeks denominate a tyrant.
— from Cicero's Tusculan Disputations by Marcus Tullius Cicero - Some might denominate these people the Methodists of Buddhism.
— from The Religions of Japan, from the Dawn of History to the Era of Méiji by William Elliot Griffis - mon ami, you have earnestly besought of me a favor which you have been pleased to denominate priceless.
— from The Works of Edgar Allan Poe, The Raven Edition by Edgar Allan Poe - Just what Doctor Dubble L. Dee would denominate an extraordinary concurrence of events.
— from The Works of Edgar Allan Poe, The Raven Edition by Edgar Allan Poe - Now when the appetite is in such a state we denominate it obedient and chastened.
— from The Ethics of Aristotle by Aristotle - So as I take it to be denominate of the king of the Hebrews, which is famous with you, and no stranger to us.
— from New Atlantis by Francis Bacon - In reality, of course, the two sorts of rites which we denominate thus are closely associated; we shall see that they suppose one another.
— from The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life by Émile Durkheim - In philosophical language, we must denominate this intermediate faculty in all its degrees and determinations, the IMAGINATION.
— from Biographia Literaria by Samuel Taylor Coleridge - My poor mother used to lament what she, in the plenitude of her ignorance, was pleased to denominate my disadvantages.
— from Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, August 7, 1841 by Various - Mr. Bonbon had wealth in his van—the lady had wealth in herself; hence it was, in every respect, what the world would denominate an equal match.
— from Aesop's Fables by Aesop
