trope

• POS: Noun

CIDE DICTIONARY

trope, n. [L. tropus, Gr. , fr. to turn. See Torture, and cf. Trophy, Tropic, Troubadour, Trover.].

 The use of a word or expression in a different sense from that which properly belongs to it; the use of a word or expression as changed from the original signification to another, for the sake of giving life or emphasis to an idea; a figure of speech.  [1913 Webster]
" Tropes are chiefly of four kinds: metaphor, metonymy, synecdoche, and irony. Some authors make figures the genus, of which trope is a species; others make them different things, defining trope to be a change of sense, and figure to be any ornament, except what becomes so by such change."  [1913 Webster]
"In his frequent, long, and tedious speeches, it has been said that a trope never passed his lips."  [1913 Webster]

OXFORD DICTIONARY

trope, n. a figurative (e.g. metaphorical or ironical) use of a word.

Etymology

L tropus f. Gk tropos turn, way, trope f. trepo turn

ROGET THESAURUS

trope

Metaphor

N metaphor, figure of speech, facon de parler, way of speaking, colloquialism, phrase, figure, trope, metaphor, enallage, catachresis, metonymy, synecdoche, autonomasia, irony, figurativeness, image, imagery, metalepsis, type, anagoge, simile, personification, prosopopoeia, allegory, apologue, parable, fable, allusion, adumbration, application, exaggeration, hyperbole, association, association of ideas (analogy), metaphorical, figurative, catachrestical, typical, tralatitious, parabolic, allegorical, allusive, anagogical, ironical, colloquial, tropical, so to speak, so to say, so to express oneself, as it were, mutato nomine de te fabula narratur.