phantasmal

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English

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Etymology

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From phantasm or phantasma (phantasm) +‎ -al (suffix meaning ‘of or pertaining to’ forming adjectives).[1]

Pronunciation

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Adjective

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phantasmal (comparative more phantasmal, superlative most phantasmal)

  1. Of or pertaining to, or having the characteristics of, a phantasm (something seen but having no physical reality); imaginary, unreal.
    Synonyms: phantasmatic, phantasmatical, phantasmic, phantasmical, phantomatic
    • 1813, Percy Bysshe Shelley, “Canto VII”, in Queen Mab; [], London: [] P. B. Shelley, [], →OCLC, page 98:
      The matter of which dreams are made / Not more endowed with actual life / Than this phantasmal portraiture / Of wandering human thought.
    • 1910 October 1, G[ilbert] K[eith] Chesterton, “The Queer Feet”, in The Innocence of Father Brown, London, New York, N.Y.: Cassell and Company, published 1911, →OCLC, page 80:
      Mr. Audley, the chairman, was an amiable, elderly man who still wore Gladstone collars; he was a kind of symbol of all that phantasmal and yet fixed society.
    • 1916 December 29, James Joyce, chapter II, in A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, New York, N.Y.: B[enjamin] W. Huebsch, →OCLC, page 93:
      [H]e had heard about him the constant voices of his father and of his masters, urging him to be a gentleman above all things and urging him to be a good catholic above all things. [] And it was the din of all these hollowsounding voices that made him halt irresolutely in the pursuit of phantoms. He gave them ear only for a time but he was happy only when he was far from them, beyond their call, alone or in the company of phantasmal comrades.
    • 1922 February, James Joyce, “[Episode 1: Telemachus]”, in Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company, [], →OCLC, part I [Telemachia], page 10:
      Her secrets: old feather fans, tassled dancecards, powdered with musk, a gaud of amber beads in her locked drawer. [] Phantasmal mirth, folded away: muskperfumed.
    1. Of or pertaining to, or having the characteristics of, a phantom (apparition or ghost); ghostly, spectral.
      Synonyms: see Thesaurus:ghostly
    2. (parapsychology) Of or pertaining to, or having the characteristics of, a phantasm (perception or vision of a living or dead person who is not physically present, often through telepathy).

Alternative forms

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Derived terms

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Translations

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References

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  1. ^ phantasmal, adj.”, in OED Online Paid subscription required, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, July 2023; phantasmal, adj.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.

Further reading

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