Likeness

How to spell likeness

8 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce likeness

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does likeness mean?

1. nounThe quality or fact of being similar in appearance or character to someone or something else.
2. nounA picture, carving, or other representation that captures a person's appearance.

Likeness in a sentence

• The twins share a striking likeness that confuses their colleagues.

• The artist painted a faithful likeness of the retiring chairman.

• There is a clear likeness between the new policy and the one it replaced.

• The coin bears the likeness of the late monarch.

Where does likeness come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This is a thoroughly native English word, descending from the Old English 'gelicnes', a noun built on 'gelic' meaning 'similar' or 'alike', which itself goes back to a Germanic root 'lik' meaning 'body, form, or shape'. The underlying idea was that two things sharing the same form or body were 'alike', so a likeness was literally a shared form. The abstract suffix '-ness', also native English, turned the adjective into a noun naming the quality of being similar. From the medieval period the word also took on the concrete sense of a picture, portrait, or carving that captures someone's appearance, since such an image shares the form of its subject. Because both the root 'like' and the suffix '-ness' are familiar everyday pieces, the spelling holds together neatly with no foreign surprises.

How the word is built

• like (similar, resembling)
• -ness (suffix forming a noun of state or quality)