Symbolize

/ˈsɪmbəlaɪz/ · verb

Meaning

(transitive) To be symbolic of; to represent..

Definitions by Sense

1. (transitive) To be symbolic of; to represent.
2. (transitive, intransitive) To use symbols; to represent ideas symbolically.
3. (transitive) To convert something into a symbol.
4. (intransitive, obsolete) To resemble each other in qualities or properties; to correspond; to harmonize.
5. (intransitive, obsolete) To hold the same faith; to agree.

Example Sentences

Doves often symbolize peace.

The broken chain symbolizes freedom.

The popular late Middle Ages fictional character Robin Hood, dressed in green to symbolize the forest, dodged fines for forest offenses and stole from the rich to give to the poor. But his appeal was painfully real and embodied the struggle over wood.

The overwhelming majority of these poems consists of wedding-songs, intended for the various ceremonies of the wedding and the daily festivities of the first week after the wedding. But these are not wedding-songs in the ordinary sense. In them, the wedding is symbolized. The poet speaks, indeed, of bride and bridegroom. But thereby he in no sense signifies the young human pair, but rather, true to cabbalistic implication, he intends the bridegroom to be God while the bride is the personified people of Israel.

The pleasing of colour symbolizeth with the pleasing of any single tone to the ear; but the pleasing of order doth symbolize with harmony.

They both symbolize in this, that they love to look upon themselves through multiplying glasses.

The believers in pretended miracles have always previously symbolized with the performers of them.

Synonyms for symbolize

Antonyms for symbolize

Related Words

Word Forms

• symbolizes
• symbolizing
• symbolized
• symbolise

Usage Notes

Choose a synonym only when it preserves the intended meaning, tone, and grammar of the full sentence.

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