Lemma

Definitions

1. A proposition proved or accepted for immediate use in the proof of some other proposition.
2. A female given name.
   rare
3. The outer shell of a fruit or similar body.
4. A proposition originally used for such a purpose, but having later acquired a greater, independent, importance; a fundamental (often pithy) and widely-used result.
   broadly
5. One of the specialized bracts around the floret in grasses.
6. The canonical form of an inflected word; i.e., the form usually found as the headword in a dictionary, such as the nominative singular of a noun, the bare infinitive of a verb, etc.
7. The theoretical abstract conceptual form of a word, representing a specific meaning, before the creation of a specific phonological form as the sounds of a lexeme, which may find representation in a specific written form as a dictionary or lexicographic word.

Equivalents

Examples

“"We finally did it, but we found the proof very, very hard," [Dr. Conway] said. "I remember⟳ my wife and I spending one entire afternoon just working on some tiny little lemmas involved in the proof."”

“Holonym: lexeme (holonymous sense⟳)”

“For the second sense⟳, where "word" means "item that should have⟳ its own⟳ dictionary entry," lexicographers sometimes use⟳ the term "lemma," but that has other meanings too, so among linguists the term lexeme is now standard, and I'll use⟳ it. For the different forms or shapes that belong⟳ to a lexeme we can use⟳ the term word-form.”

“For quotations using this term, see⟳ Citations:lemma.”

CEFR level