SYNONYM

A synonym is a word or expression that has the same or almost the same meaning as another.

Synonym Examples:

• awful / terrible
• big / large
• smart / clever
• photograph / picture

Word origin: Greek, syn = same, onyma= a name

Short List of Synonyms in English, Listed by the Part of Speech

Nouns

• belly / stomach
• children / kids
• disaster / catastrophe
• earth / soil
• father / dad
• happiness / joy
• instinct / intuition
• mother / mom
• present / gift
• sunrise / dawn

Verbs

• answer / reply
• beat / defeat
• behave / act
• begin / start
• close / shut
• leave / exit
• provide / supply
• select / choose
• shout / yell
• speak / talk

Adjectives

• big / large
• complete / total
• correct / right
• crazy / mad
• foolish / silly
• happy / glad
• hard / difficult
• ill / sick
• last / final
• near / close
• sad / unhappy
• stable / steady

Adverbs

• abroad / overseas
• almost / nearly
• badly / poorly
• fast / quickly
• intentionally / on purpose
• out / outside
• rarely / seldom
• sometimes / occasionally
• surely / for sure
• very / highly / extremely

Prepositions

• above / over
• about / regarding / concerning
• against / versus
• below / beneath / under
• by / via
• despite / in spite of
• in / into
• off / away
• until / till
• with / including

Conjunctions

• and / plus
• because / since
• but / yet
• if / provided
• once / as soon as

Interjections

• hello / hi
• gee / gosh
• goodness / goodness me / my goodness
• no / nope
• oh Lord / good Lord
• thanks / thank you
• whoopee / yahoo / hooray
• yes / yeah

Synonyms are not necessarily the same!

You see, they can be very similar, but they do not necessarily mean the same.

Here is a common example.

The following words are all synonyms. Their general meaning is "pleasant to look at."

There are however important nuances.

Look at the illustrations, read the definitions and see for yourself.

Example

One of the meanings of "hurt" is to "to be painful."

For example, "My back hurts like hell."

One synonym of "hurt" is "ache."

"To ache" means "to be painful, in a dull way." A dull pain means that it is not very strong, but it is continuous.

For example, "I've been standing for so long that now my feet ache."

So you see, "hurt" and "ache" are synonyms. Their meanings are indeed very similar, but not identical.