Resemblance

How to spell resemblance

11 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce resemblance

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does resemblance mean?

1. nounA similarity in appearance, character, or nature between two people or things.

Resemblance in a sentence

• The resemblance between the twins fooled their new teacher all term.

• There is a clear resemblance between her early sketches and the finished mural.

Where does resemblance come from?

Language of origin: French

This word travelled into English from Old French in the late 1300s, built on the verb resembler, meaning 'to be like' or 'to look similar to'. That French verb combined an intensifying re- with sembler, 'to seem' or 'to appear', which traces back to the Latin similare or simulare, 'to make alike' or 'to copy'. At the root of all of this sits the Latin adjective similis, simply meaning 'like' or 'similar', the same ancestor that gives English 'similar', 'assemble', and even 'simulate'. The noun form added the French suffix -ance, which English regularly attaches to mark a quality or state, and that ending is exactly the spelling trap: writers often reach for the rival -ence. Remembering the family link to 'assemble', also spelled with -ble, helps fix the middle of the word, and seeing similis behind it explains why resemblance is fundamentally about one thing looking like another.

How the word is built

• re- (intensive)
• sembl- (from Latin similis: like, similar)
• -ance (noun suffix)