Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun A family name; a surname.
- noun The third and usually last name of a citizen of ancient Rome, as Caesar in Gaius Julius Caesar.
- noun A name, especially a descriptive nickname or epithet acquired through usage over a period of time.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun A surname; a distinguishing name; specifically, the last of the three names by which a Roman of good family was known, indicating the house to which he belonged. See
name . - noun Loosely, a name, whether a given name, surname, or distinguishing epithet.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun The last of the three names of a person among the ancient Romans, denoting his house or family.
- noun (Eng. Law) A surname.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun
surname - noun the third part of the name of a
citizen ofancient Rome - noun a
nickname orepithet by which someone isidentified ; abyname ; amoniker orsobriquet
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun a familiar name for a person (often a shortened version of a person's given name)
- noun the name used to identify the members of a family (as distinguished from each member's given name)
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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Anderson: Lawyerly Type, your cognomen is mischosen.
The Volokh Conspiracy » Virginia “Confederate History Month” Proclamation 2010
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I see that a daily paper in New York whose cognomen is borrowed from a very large object, has suggested that Secretary Seward should retire from Mr. Johnson's Cabinet in order to conciliate these Southern traitors, he being to them a very offensive object.
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Colleen McCullough in her 'Masters of Rome' series managed the profusion of Julias using dimunitives (Julia, Julilla), nicknames (two little girls called Ju-ju and Lia) and a sort of 'cognomen' addition e.g.
Character names in historical fiction Carla 2006
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That might not be quite it, because what I'm thinking of is like cognomen but for fitting in the line of poetry, and I don't know if there's a separate word for that.
mrissa: Also mrissa 2010
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That might not be quite it, because what I'm thinking of is like cognomen but for fitting in the line of poetry, and I don't know if there's a separate word for that.
Barnstorming on an Invisible Segway timprov 2010
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Anderson: Lawyerly Type, your cognomen is mischosen.
The Volokh Conspiracy » Virginia “Confederate History Month” Proclamation 2010
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Under this appellation, he released fifteen or so albums (including the pop gem Adam's Apple), contributed material to soundtracks such as High Fidelity, been joined onstage and on recordings by a total of artists too large to tally here, and he is a critically-acclaimed writer (Listerine: The Life And Opinions Of Lawrence Stern) and novelist (Misfortune) under his Stace cognomen.
Mike Ragogna: New Tunes On Monday : Little Walter, Prince, James Taylor, John Wesley Harding, Paul Carrack, and Matthew Barber Mike Ragogna 2010
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The name was chosen because “Lucifer, the ancient name of the Morning Star, now called Venus, seems to us unsurpassed as a cognomen for a journal whose mission is to bring light to the dwellers in darkness.”
HCR: Pelosi tells the simple-minded American people not to worry our pretty little heads about it 2010
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Under this appellation, he released fifteen or so albums (including the pop gem Adam's Apple), contributed material to soundtracks such as High Fidelity, been joined onstage and on recordings by a total of artists too large to tally here, and he is a critically-acclaimed writer (Listerine: The Life And Opinions Of Lawrence Stern) and novelist (Misfortune) under his Stace cognomen.
Mike Ragogna: New Tunes On Monday : Little Walter, Prince, James Taylor, John Wesley Harding, Paul Carrack, and Matthew Barber Mike Ragogna 2010
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Usually in Kracton this cognomen of facial appearance would all be taken as a sign of intelligence headed toward an adulthood of wisdom.
Preacher Jefferson 2009
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