[Sidenote: Definition of homophone.]
When two or more words different in origin and signification are
pronounced alike, whether they are alike or not in their spelling,
they are said to be homophonous, or homophones of each other. Such
words if spoken without context are of ambiguous signification.
Homophone is strictly a relative term, but it is convenient to use it
absolutely, and to call any word of this kind a homophone.[1]
[Footnote 1: Homophone is a Greek word meaning 'same-sounding', and
before using the relative word in this double way I have preferred
to make what may seem a needless explanation. It is convenient, for
instance, to say that _son_ and _heir_ are both homophones, meaning
that each belongs to that particular class of words which without
context are of ambiguous signification: and it is convenient also to
say that _son_ and _sun_ and _heir_ and _air_ are homophones without
explaining that it is meant that they are mutually homophonous, which
is evident. A physician congratulating a friend on the birth of his
first-born might say, 'Now that you have a son and heir, see that he
gets enough sun and air'.]
Homophony is between words as _significant_ sounds, but it is needful
to state that homophonous words must be _different_ words, else we
should include a whole class of words which are not true homophones.
Such words as _draft_, _train_, _board_, have each of them separate
meanings as various and distinct as some true homophones; for
instance, a draught of air, the miraculous draught of fishes, the
draught of a ship, the draft of a picture, or a draught of medicine,
or the present draft of this essay, though it may ultimately appear
medicinal, are, some of them, quite as distinct objects or notions
as, for instance, _vane_ and _vein_ are: but the ambiguity of _draft_,
however spelt, is due to its being the name of anything that is
_drawn_; and since there are many ways of drawing things, and
different things are drawn in different ways, the _same word_ has come
to carry very discrepant significations.
Though such words as these[2] are often inconveniently and even
distressingly ambiguous, they are not homophones, and are therefore
excluded from my list: they exhibit different meanings of one word,
not the same sound of different words: they are of necessity present,
I suppose, in all languages, and corresponding words in independent
languages will often develop exactly corresponding varieties of
meaning. But since the ultimate origin and derivation of a word is
sometimes uncertain, the scientific distinction cannot be strictly
enforced.
[Footnote 2: Such words have no technical class-name; they are merely
extreme examples of the ambiguity common to most words, which grows
up naturally from divergence of meaning. True homophones are separate
words which have, or have acquired, an illogical fortuitous identity.]
[Sidenote: False homophones.]
Now, wherever the same derivation of any two same-sounding words is
at all doubtful, such words are practically homophones:--and again in
cases where the derivation is certainly the same, yet, if the ultimate
meanings have so diverged that we cannot easily resolve them into one
idea, as we always can _draft_, these also may be practically reckoned
as homophones.
_Continent_, adjective and substantive, is an example of absolute
divergence of meaning, inherited from the Latin; but as they are
different parts of speech, I allow their plea of identical derivation
and exclude them from my list. On the other hand, the substantive
_beam_ is an example of such a false homophone as I include. _Beam_
may signify a balk of timber, or a ray of light. Milton's address to
light begins