phantasia
English
Etymology
Borrowed from Latin phantasia (“fancy, fantasy; imagination”),[1] and from its etymon Ancient Greek φᾰντᾰσῐ́ᾱ (phantasíā, “appearance, look; display, presentation; pageantry, pomp; impression, perception; image”), from φᾰ́ντᾰσῐς (phántasis) + -ῐ́ᾱ (-íā, suffix forming feminine abstract nouns). Φᾰ́ντᾰσῐς (Phántasis) is derived from φᾰντᾰ́ζω (phantázō, “to make visible, show; to become visible, appear; to imagine”), from φαίνω (phaínō, “to appear; to reveal; to shine”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *bʰeh₂- (“to shine”). The English word is a doublet of fancy, fantasia, fantasy, and phantasy.
Pronunciation
- (Received Pronunciation) IPA(key): /fænˈteɪ.zɪ.ə/, /-ˈtɑː-/, /fænˈteɪ.ʒə/, /ˌfæn.təˈziː.ə/
Audio (RP) (file) - (General American) IPA(key): /fænˈteɪ.zi.ə/, /fænˈteɪ.ʒə/
- Hyphenation: phan‧ta‧sia
Noun
phantasia (plural phantasias)
- (dated) Something imaginary; a fantasy.
- 1872 November, Carl Proegler, “Article II. The Panaritium (Felon)—Consequences and Treatment.”, in J. Adams Allen and Walter Hay, editors, The Chicago Medical Journal. A Monthly Record of Medicine, Surgery and the Collateral Sciences, volume XXIX, number 11, Chicago, Ill.: W. B. Keen, Cooke & Co., OCLC 1778062, pages 656–657:
- But even here suppuration does not always stop, reaching often the fore-arm, and in such cases even life is endangered. Unhealthy granulations, thrombosis of veins, septicæmia and pyæmia cause death. This picture is not merely a phantasia, but exists in reality, and I myself had occasion to witness two cases of this kind in the surgical wards of Berlin; [...]
- 1872, John Henry Newman, “Palmer on Faith and Unity”, in Essays Critical and Historical, volume I, 2nd edition, London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], OCLC 676797886, page 146:
- When one thing fits into another, when all the parts mutually support and are supported, when a theory is capable of accounting for all questions, and thus is, in a certain sense, self-balanced and self-sustained and entire, we have a phantasia of truth forced upon our minds, even against our will.
- 1878, James Phelan, “Life of Philip Massinger”, in On Philip Massinger: A Dissertation for the Acquisition of the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy from the University of Leipsic, Halle: E. Karras, […], OCLC 17201591, page 43:
- What we consider a clear logical conclusive chain of argument is as often a phantasia.
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- (philosophy) A phantasm (an impression received through the senses) or the faculty of receiving or representing these impressions.
- 1978, Martha Craven Nussbaum, Aristotle’s De Motu Animalium […], Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, published 1985, →ISBN, page 261:
- Phantasia, then, is the animal's awareness of some object or state of affairs, which may well prove to be an object of desire. [...] I am thirsty; I have (in the absence of the object) a phantasia of drink. [...] Phantasia can also be used to account for delusion in practical cases: "Poor dog, he saw that as water (or as drink) when it was really ammonia solution."
- 1994, Derk Pereboom, “Stoic Psychotherapy in Descartes and Spinoza”, in Genevieve Lloyd, editor, Spinoza: Critical Assessments, volume I (Context, Sources and the Early Writings), London; New York, N.Y.: Routledge, published 2001, →ISBN, section I, page 150:
- [T]he possibility of eating a piece of pie might be presented to you by your seeing it on the kitchen table. This stage is called phantasia, presentation or impression. Corresponding to a phantasia is a lekton, a proposition or sayable, for example, it is fitting for me to eat that piece of pie, which the agent entertains but does not necessarily endorse when she has a phantasia.
- 2005, Mihály Szívós, “Temporality, Reification and Subjectivity: Carneades and the Foundations of the World of Subjectivity”, in Pierluigi Barrotta and Marcelo Dascal, editors, Controversies and Subjectivity (Controversies; 1), Amsterdam; Philadelphia, Pa.: John Benjamins Publishing Company, →ISBN, ISSN 1574-1583, section 4.2 (The Temporalization of the Cognition Process I), page 216:
- Chrysippus called 'experience' the "treasury of phantasias", [...] According to Chrysippus, the phantasias burdened with appearances can be distinguished from the true ones by the mobilization of former groups of phantasias and by the operations with them.
- 2014, Dermot Moran, “‘The Secret Folds of Nature’: Eriugena’s Expansive Concept of Nature”, in Alfred Kentigern Siewers, editor, Re-imagining Nature: Environmental Humanities and Ecosemiotics, Lewisburg, Pa.: Bucknell University Press; Lanham, Md.: Rowman & Littlefield, →ISBN, part II (Medieval Natures), page 109:
- Everything in the created world has to be understood not just an appearance or image—a phantasia, in [John Scotus] Eriugena's vocabulary—but as at the same time a divine revelation or manifestation, [...]
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- Dated spelling of fantasia.
- 1853 July, Thomas Buchanan Read, “Pilgrims of the Great St. Bernard”, in George R[ex] Graham, editor, Graham’s Magazine, volume XLIII, number 1, Philadelphia, Pa.: [Watson & Co. […]?], OCLC 1084623504, chapter VIII, page 105:
- The little Italian party, before alluded to, had collected around the piano. The white and plump fingers of the gay and black-eyed daughter of the Roman marchioness were tripping lightly up and down the octaves of the instrument, and her little tastefully arranged head was merrily dancing from side to side, keeping time to the half-improvised phantasia, which trickled like a wayward stream from her hands.
- 1857, Hugh James Rose, “AURENHAMMER,[sic – meaning AUERNHAMMER] (Josepha)”, in A New General Biographical Dictionary, […], volume II, London: T. Fellowes, […], OCLC 960877771, pages 368–369:
- She [Josepha Barbara Auernhammer] published subsequently many works of her own, (in all 63,) which, as well as her play, especially the extempore phantasias, were distinguished by much delicate feeling and a vivid imagination.
- 1872 October 19, “The Cutting of the Nile: From The Pall Mall Gazette”, in Littel’s Living Age, volume XXVII (Fourth Series; volume CXV overall), number 1480, Boston, Mass.: Littel & Gay, OCLC 913200987, page 189, column 2:
- It is, however, a ceremony of immense antiquity, and the chief civil festival of the year among the Arabs, who love nothing more dearly than a "phantasia" of this sort.
- 1966, Brian W[esterdale] Downs, “Ibsen before 1884”, in Modern Norwegian Literature 1860–1918, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: University Press, published 2010, →ISBN, page 44:
- [The Warrior's Barrow (Kjæmpehøjen)] admirably conformed to his employers' National-Romantic aims. This is equally true of the four new plays with which [Henrik] Ibsen honoured his contract: St. John's Night) (Sancthansnatten, 1853), a phantasia having a good deal in common with [William] Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream [...]
- 1987, Nina Auerbach, “Our Lady of the Lyceum”, in Joan DeJean, Carroll Smith-Rosenberg, Peter Stallybrass, and Gary Tomlinson, editors, Ellen Terry, Player in Her Time (New Cultural Studies), Philadelphia, Pa.: University of Pennsylvania Press, published 1997, →ISBN, page 209:
- These are the years in which she [Ellen Terry] begins to sign her letters in a phantasia of different names.
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Derived terms
- aphantasia
- aphantasiac
- hyperphantasia
- hyperphantasiac
- phantasiac
Translations
something imaginary — see fantasy
impression that is received through the senses
References
- Compare “fantasia, n.”, in OED Online
, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, 1895; “fantasia, n.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
Anagrams
- Sahaptian
French
Pronunciation
- Homophones: phantasias, phantasiât
Verb
phantasia
- third-person singular past historic of phantasier
Latin
Alternative forms
- fantasia
Etymology
From Ancient Greek φαντασία (phantasía).
Pronunciation
- (Classical) IPA(key): /pʰanˈta.si.a/, [pʰän̪ˈt̪äs̠iä]
- (Ecclesiastical) IPA(key): /fanˈta.si.a/, [fän̪ˈt̪äːs̬iä]
Noun
phantasia f (genitive phantasiae); first declension
- fancy, idea, notion; fantasy
- phantom, apparition
- imagination
- phase (of the moon)
Declension
First-declension noun.
| Case | Singular | Plural |
|---|---|---|
| Nominative | phantasia | phantasiae |
| Genitive | phantasiae | phantasiārum |
| Dative | phantasiae | phantasiīs |
| Accusative | phantasiam | phantasiās |
| Ablative | phantasiā | phantasiīs |
| Vocative | phantasia | phantasiae |
Descendants
- Catalan: fantasia
- Galician: fantasía
- Italian: fantasia
- → English: fantasia
- → German: Fantasia
- → Greek: φαντασία (fantasía)
- Old French: fantasie (see there for further descendants)
- French: fantasie
- → English: fantasy
- → Romanian: fantezie
- Piedmontese: fantasìa
- Portuguese: fantasia
- Spanish: fantasía
- Borrowings
Some words here may be borrowed via an intermediate language, rather than directly from Latin.
- Albanian: fantazi
- Arabic: فانتازيا (fāntāziyā), فنتازيا (fantāziyā)
- Armenian: ֆանտազիա (fantazia)
- Belarusian: фантазія (fantazija)
- Bulgarian: фантазия (fantazija)
- Czech: fantazie
- Danish: fantasi
- English: phantasia
- Finnish: fantasia
- Georgian: ფანტაზია (panṭazia)
- Hungarian: fantázia
- Japanese: ファンタジー (fantajī)
- Macedonian: фантазија (fantazija)
- Middle High German: fantasīe
- Alemannic German: Fantasii
- German: Fantasie, Phantasie
- German: Phantasei
- Norwegian: fantasi
- Persian: فانتزی (fântezi)
- Polish: fantazja
- Russian: фантазия (fantazija)
- Serbo-Croatian: fantazija / фантазија
- Slovak: fantázia
- Slovene: fantazija
- Swedish: fantasi
- Ukrainian: фантазія (fantazija)
- Uzbek: fantaziya
References
- “phantasia”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
- phantasia in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition with additions by D. P. Carpenterius, Adelungius and others, edited by Léopold Favre, 1883–1887)
- phantasia in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette
- phantasia in Ramminger, Johann (accessed 16 July 2016) Neulateinische Wortliste: Ein Wörterbuch des Lateinischen von Petrarca bis 1700, pre-publication website, 2005-2016
- “phantasia”, in William Smith, editor (1848) A Dictionary of Greek Biography and Mythology, London: John Murray