litotes

See also: Litotes and lítotes

English

Wikipedia

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) enPR: lītō'tēz, IPA^(key): /laɪˈtəʊ.tiːz/
• Hyphenation: li-to-tes

Etymology

From French litote, from Ancient Greek λιτότης ‎(litótēs), from λιτός ‎(litós, “simple”).

Noun

litotes ‎(uncountable)

1. (rhetoric) An ironic figure of speech whereby something is stated by denying its opposite, particularly the negation of a negative quality to say something positive.

Hypernyms

• irony
• understatement, meiosis

Antonyms

• See hyperbole

Translations

rhetoric: stating a point by denying its opposite

• Catalan: lítote f
• Esperanto: litoto, maltroigo
• Finnish: litoteesi
• French: litote (fr) f
• German: Litotes (de) f
• Greek: λιτότητα (el) ‎(litótita)

  Ancient: λιτότης f ‎(litótēs)

• Ido: litoto (io)
• Irish: liotóid f

• Italian: litote (it) f
• Manx: fo-raa m
• Portuguese: litotes f
• Russian: лито́та (ru) f ‎(litóta)
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: литота f

  Latin: litota (sh) f

• Spanish: litote (es) f, lítotes f
• Tagalog: makumbaba

See also

• paradiastole
• double negative

Anagrams

• toilets

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French

Noun

litotes f

1. plural of litote

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Portuguese

Noun

litotes f (plural litotes)

1. (rhetoric) litotes (an understatement employed for rhetoric effect)