periphrastic.
Expressed in more words than are necessary.
Meaning & usage
Expressed in more words than are necessary.
He wrote a periphrastic love letter to his wife to patch up their relationship.
She was simply asked to express how she felt, but her response was periphrastic.
Indirect in naming an entity; circumlocutory.
Characterized by periphrasis.
“The daughter of the man” may be used as a periphrastic synonym for “the man’s daughter”.
Where this word comes from
Borrowed from Ancient Greek περιφραστικός (periphrastikós), from περίφρασις (períphrasis, “periphrasis”).
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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.
Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.