ESSENCE
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essence - Wiktionary, the free dictionary
Etymology
From Middle English essence, from Middle French essence, from Latin essentia (“the being or essence of a thing”),
from an artificial formation of esse (“to be”),
to translate Ancient Greek οὐσία (ousía, “being”),
from ὤν (ṓn), present participle of εἰμί (eimí, “I am, exist”).
Pronunciation
| Audio (US): | Duration: 2 seconds.0:02 |
- Rhymes: -ɛsəns
Noun
essence (countable and uncountable, plural essences)
- The inherent nature of a thing or idea. quotations ▼
- (philosophy) The true nature of anything, not accidental or illusory.
- Constituent substance. quotations ▼
- A being; especially, a purely spiritual being. quotations ▼
- A significant feature of something.
- (Can we add an example for this sense?)
- The concentrated form of a plant or drug obtained through a distillation process.
- essence of Jojoba
- An extract or concentrate obtained from a plant or other matter used for flavouring, or as a restorative. quotations ▼
- vanilla essence
- Fragrance, a perfume. quotations ▼
Synonyms
- (inherent nature): quintessence, whatness; See also Thesaurus:essence
- (significant feature): gist, crux; See also Thesaurus:gist
- (fragrance): aroma, bouquet; See also Thesaurus:aroma
Derived terms
- coffee essence
- essenced
- essenceless
- essence peddler
- glabrescence
- hyperessence
- in essence
- k-essence
- of the essence; time is of the essence
- paradessence
- superessence
- unessence
- vanilla essence
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Related terms
Translations
show ▼±inherent nature
show ▼±true nature of something
show ▼±constituent substance
show ▼±spiritual being
show ▼±significant feature
show ▼±concentrated form of a plant
show ▼±extract or concentrate used as flavouring
show ▼±fragrance
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Further reading
- “essence”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
- William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “essence”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.
Anagrams
French
Etymology
From Old French, from Latin essentia. Sense 2 very likely from Latin edō (“eat”), in the sense of 'what is eaten, fuel'. Many forms of the latter are indistinguishable from the former, and so the confusion with essence is very understandable.
Pronunciation
| Audio: | Duration: 1 second.0:01 |
Noun
essence f (plural essences)
Derived terms
Descendants
Further reading
- “essence”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.