Meaning

(obsolete) A singing..

Definitions by Sense

1. (obsolete) A singing.
2. Synonym of incantation.

Example Sentences

These words were jabbered as fast as ever tongue could utter them, and when he had finished, up he jumped, again commenced the same mad rotations, and broke into the same extravagant cantation as before.

When we have come to hear thy sweet oblation Of love and joyance from thy sylvan station, Why, in the place of musical cantation, Balk us with pratings?

For thirty years there has seemed to me no difference between phonation (speech) and cantation (song), save in the length of the basic vowel sounds.

When we use it with the dying it has to do with helping people unbind from the body, so we provide a lot of music outside of time—Gregorian chant, Hebrew cantation [Chalice workers don't use only Christian music].

Whether or not there was any mystic virtue in the exorcisory cantation of the previous night, I cannot determine; but it is certain, that next morning, though headaches abounded among our officers, indications of the yellow fever there were none.

This literature contained a corpus of texts, most probably one for each school of Vedic cantation (the words śakhā, 'school' or 'branch', speaks in favor of this guess).

He picked up the bows and began a soft cantation, long spoken by his father before him.

Word Forms

• cantations

Synonyms for cantation

Related Words

When Should You Use Cantation?

Use cantation when its meaning, tone and grammar fit the full sentence. A synonym is not always a direct replacement.

Practice This Word

Frequently Asked Questions