Phantasia

//fænˈteɪ.zɪ.ə// noun

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    Something imaginary; a fantasy. dated

    "But even here suppuration does not always stop, reaching often the fore-arm, and in such cases even life is endangered. Unhealthy granulations, thrombosis of veins, septicæmia and pyæmia cause death. This picture is not merely a phantasia, but exists in reality, and I myself had occasion to witness two cases of this kind in the surgical wards of Berlin; [...]"

  2. 2
    A phantasm (an impression received through the senses) or the faculty of receiving or representing these impressions.

    "Phantasia, then, is the animal's awareness of some object or state of affairs, which may well prove to be an object of desire. [...] I am thirsty; I have (in the absence of the object) a phantasia of drink. [...] Phantasia can also be used to account for delusion in practical cases: "Poor dog, he saw that as water (or as drink) when it was really ammonia solution.""

  3. 3
    Archaic spelling of fantasia. alt-of, archaic

    "The little Italian party, before alluded to, had collected around the piano. The white and plump fingers of the gay and black-eyed daughter of the Roman marchioness were tripping lightly up and down the octaves of the instrument, and her little tastefully arranged head was merrily dancing from side to side, keeping time to the half-improvised phantasia, which trickled like a wayward stream from her hands."

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin phantasia (“fancy, fantasy; imagination”), and from its etymon Ancient Greek φᾰντᾰσῐ́ᾱ (phăntăsĭ́ā, “appearance, look; display, presentation; pageantry, pomp; impression, perception; image”), from φᾰ́ντᾰσῐς (phắntăsĭs) + -ῐ́ᾱ (-ĭ́ā, suffix forming feminine abstract nouns). Φᾰ́ντᾰσῐς (Phắntăsĭs) is derived from φᾰντᾰ́ζω (phăntắzō, “to make visible, show; to become visible, appear; to imagine”), from φαίνω (phaínō, “to appear; to reveal; to shine”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *bʰeh₂- (“to shine”). The English word is a doublet of fancy, fantasia, fantasy, and phantasy.

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