Second edition

§ 3. Frequency and Stylistic Reference

Frequency is also indicative of the interdependence between polysemy, stylistic reference and emotive charge. It can easily be observed in any group of synonyms. Analysing synonymic groupings like make — manufacture — fabricate; heavy — ponderous — weighty — cumbrous; gather — assemble; face — countenance — mug we find that the neutral member of the synonymic group, e.g. make (the first 500 words) has 28 meanings, whereas its literary synonyms manufacture (the 2nd thousand) has 2 and fabricate (the 14th thousand) which has a narrow, specific stylistic reference has only one meaning. A similar relation is observed in other synonymic groups. The inference, consequently, is that
¹ Here and below the number of meanings is given according to A. Hornby, The Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary of Current English, and the frequency values according to the Thorndike Teacher’s Word Book of 30,000 Words.
² According to M. West. A General Service List of English Words. Longmans, 1959,
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stylistically neutral vocabulary units tend to be polysemantic and to have higher frequency value, whereas words of narrow or specific stylistic reference or non-literary vocabulary units are mostly monosemantic and have a low frequency value. The following examples may serve as illustration: the neutral word horse, in addition to its basic meaning, has the meanings — ‘a frame’, ‘a rope’, ‘cavalry’; its poetic synonym steed has only one meaning. The neutral word face forms a variety of word-groups in its basic meaning, in addition, it has at least 3 more meanings — ‘boldness’, ‘impudence’, e.g. to have the face to do smth; ‘an outer part’, ‘a surface’, e.g. the face of a coin, the face of a clock. The word face also enters a number of phraseological units, e.g. to put a new face on a matter, on the face of it. Its literary bookish synonym countenance has only two meanings and a much poorer collocability; its third synonym mug belongs to slang, has a heavy emotive charge, is monosemantic and its lexical valency is greatly restricted. The frequency values of these words speak for themselves — face belongs to the first 500 words, countenance to the 4th thousand and mug to the 6th thousand of the most frequently occurring words.