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Webster 1913 Edition


Symmetry

Sym′me-try

,
Noun.
[L.
symmetria
, Gr. [GREEK];
σύν
with, together + [GREEK] a measure: cf. F.
symétrie
. See
Syn-
, and
Meter
rhythm.]
1.
A due proportion of the several parts of a body to each other; adaptation of the form or dimensions of the several parts of a thing to each other; the union and conformity of the members of a work to the whole.
2.
(Biol.)
The law of likeness; similarity of structure; regularity in form and arrangement; orderly and similar distribution of parts, such that an animal may be divided into parts which are structurally symmetrical.
Bilateral symmetry, or two-sidedness, in vertebrates, etc., is that in which the body can be divided into symmetrical halves by a vertical plane passing through the middle; radial symmetry, as in echinoderms, is that in which the individual parts are arranged symmetrically around a central axis; serial symmetry, or zonal symmetry, as in earthworms, is that in which the segments or metameres of the body are disposed in a zonal manner one after the other in a longitudinal axis. This last is sometimes called metamerism.
3.
(Bot.)
(a)
Equality in the number of parts of the successive circles in a flower.
(b)
Likeness in the form and size of floral organs of the same kind; regularity.
Axis of symmetry
.
(Geom.)
See under
Axis
.
Respective symmetry
,
that disposition of parts in which only the opposite sides are equal to each other.

Webster 1828 Edition


Symmetry

SYM'METRY

,
Noun.
[Gr. with, together, and to measure.] A due proportion of the several parts of a body to each other; adaptation of the dimensions of the several parts of a thing to each other; or the union and conformity of the members of a work to the whole. Symmetry arises from the proportion which the Greeks call analogy, which is the relation of conformity of all the parts to a certain measure; as the symmetry of a building or an animal body.
Uniform symmetry, in architecture, is where the same ordonnance reigns throughout the whole.
symmetry, is where only the opposite sides are equal to each other.

Definition 2024


symmetry

symmetry

English

Noun

symmetry (countable and uncountable, plural symmetries)

  1. Exact correspondence on either side of a dividing line, plane, center or axis.
  2. (uncountable) The satisfying arrangement of a balanced distribution of the elements of a whole.
    • 1922, Ben Travers, chapter 1, in A Cuckoo in the Nest:
      She was like a Beardsley Salome, he had said. And indeed she had the narrow eyes and the high cheekbone of that creature, and as nearly the sinuosity as is compatible with human symmetry.

Related terms

Translations

References

  1. In poetic usage, symmetry is sometimes pronounced sĭʹmĭtrī, as, for example, in the first verse of William Blake’s “The Tyger” in Songs of Experience (1794):
    Tyger Tyger, burning bright, // In the forests of the night: // What immortal hand or eye, // Could frame thy fearful symmetry?