Picture

//ˈpɪk(t)ʃə// noun, verb, slang

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    A representation of anything (as a person, a landscape, a building) upon canvas, paper, or other surface, by drawing, painting, printing, photography, etc.

    "Orion hit a rabbit once; but though sore wounded it got to the bury, and, struggling in, the arrow caught the side of the hole and was drawn out.[…]. Ikey the blacksmith had forged us a spearhead after a sketch from a picture of a Greek warrior; and a rake-handle served as a shaft."

  2. 2
    graphic art consisting of an artistic composition made by applying paints to a surface wordnet
  3. 3
    An image; a representation as in the imagination.

    "My eyes make pictures when they are shut."

  4. 4
    a representation of a person or scene in the form of a print or transparent slide or in digital format wordnet
  5. 5
    A painting.

    "There was a picture hanging above the fireplace."

Show 18 more definitions
  1. 6
    a visual representation (of an object or scene or person or abstraction) produced on a surface wordnet
  2. 7
    A photograph.

    "I took a picture of the church."

  3. 8
    a typical example of some state or quality wordnet
  4. 9
    A motion picture. India, dated

    "Casablanca is my all-time favorite picture."

  5. 10
    a clear and telling mental image wordnet
  6. 11
    ("the pictures") Cinema (as a form of entertainment). in-plural, informal

    "Let's go to the pictures."

  7. 12
    the visible part of a television transmission wordnet
  8. 13
    A paragon, a perfect example or specimen (of a category).

    "She's the very picture of health."

  9. 14
    a form of entertainment that enacts a story by sound and a sequence of images giving the illusion of continuous movement wordnet
  10. 15
    An attractive sight.

    "The garden is a real picture at this time of year."

  11. 16
    illustrations used to decorate or explain a text wordnet
  12. 17
    The art of painting; representation by painting.

    "any well-expressed image[…]either in picture or sculpture"

  13. 18
    a graphic or vivid verbal description wordnet
  14. 19
    A figure; a model.

    "the young king's picture[…]in virgin wax"

  15. 20
    a situation treated as an observable object wordnet
  16. 21
    Situation.

    "The employment picture for the older middle class is not so good."

  17. 22
    A sample of an illegal drug. Multicultural-London-English

    "If you want me to buy your weed I’ll need a picture."

  18. 23
    A format string in the COBOL programming language.

    "The COBOL restriction for the currency symbol in a picture string to be replaced by a single character currency symbol is a compromise solution."

Verb
  1. 1
    To represent in or with a picture. transitive

    "while upon the shaded top of the box, drawn in perspective, the artist had pictured a plate with the beautifully executed, twin-lobed, brainlike, halved kernel of a walnut."

  2. 2
    imagine; conceive of; see in one's mind wordnet
  3. 3
    To imagine or envision. transitive

    "Picture yourself on a boat on a river / With tangerine trees and marmalade skies"

  4. 4
    show in, or as in, a picture wordnet
  5. 5
    To depict or describe vividly. transitive

    "I had never found him so impossible to soften or to move. I tried this way and I tried that; I pictured his future in an English gaol; I described the sorrow of his mother when I came back with the news; I said everything to touch his heart, but all to no purpose."

Etymology

Etymology 1

From Middle English pycture, from Old French picture, itself from Latin pictūra (“the art of painting, a painting”), from pingō (“I paint”). Doublet of pictura.

Etymology 2

From Middle English pycture, from Old French picture, itself from Latin pictūra (“the art of painting, a painting”), from pingō (“I paint”). Doublet of pictura.

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