Also 6 troope, 7 trop. [ad. L. tropus a figure of speech, ad. Gr. τρόπος a turn, f. τρέπειν to turn; cf. F. trope (1554 in Godef., Compl.). Sometimes app. repr. Gr. τροπή (cf. 3).]
1. Rhet. A figure of speech that consists in the use of a word or phrase in a sense other than that which is proper to it; also, in casual use, a figure of speech; figurative language.
1533. Tindale, Supper of Lord, Cv. If ye be so sworne to the litteral sense in this matter, that ye will not in these wordes of Christe, Thys is my bodye, &c., admitte in so playne a speache anye troope.
1573. Tusser, Husb., xxviii. (1878), 68. Christmas is onely a figure or trope.
a. 1638. Mede, Wks. (1672), 349. That usual Trope of Scripture, by a part, or that which is more notable or obvious in any kind or rank of things to imply the rest.
1693. Dryden, Juvenal (1697), p. liii. Where the Trope is far fetch’d, and hard, ’tis fit for nothing but to puzzle the Understanding.
1779. Sheridan, Critic, I. i. Your occasional tropes and flowers suit the general coarseness of your stile, as tambour sprigs would a ground of linsey-wolsey.
1783. Blair, Lect., Rhetoric, xiv. I. 275. Tropes … consist in a word’s being employed to signify something that is different from its original and primitive meaning: so that if you alter the word, you destroy the Figure.
1837. Macaulay, Ess., Bacon (1887), 423. Irony is one of the four primary tropes.
1876. Gladstone, Homeric Synchr., 262. To treat as a poetical trope this idea of kings as god-born or god-reared.
1888. Bryce, Amer. Commw., III. cxi. 597. [American] rhetoric is Rhodian rather than Attic, overloaded with tropes and figures.
attrib. 1799. Han. More, Fem. Educ. (ed. 4), I. x. 221. By this negligence in the just application of words, we shall be … much misled by these trope and figure ladies.
† 2. In Gregorian Music, A short distinctive cadence at the close of a melody. Obs.
1603. Holland, Plutarch’s Mor., 1358. To let passe therefore the five positures of the Tetrachords, as also the first five tones, tropes, changes, notes or harmonies.
1605. Bacon, Adv. Learn., II. v. § 3. is not the trope of music, to avoid or slide from the close or cadence, common with the trope of rhetoric of deceiving expectation? Ibid. (1626), Sylva, § 113.
† 3. [= Gr. τροπή.] The ‘turning’ of the sun at the tropic; also = TROPIC A. 2. Obs. rare.
1677. Gale, Crt. Gentiles, II. IV. 258. The Sun has … its annual Tropes and Vicissitudes, what they call Solstices, whereby it is nearer to or remoter from us.
1735. H. Brooke, Univ. Beauty, IV. 169. Now ’thwart the trope, or zone antartic steer.
† 4. Logic. = MOOD sb.2 1. Obs. rare.
1656. Stanley, Hist. Philos., VIII. (1701), 315/1. Of Moods or Tropes there are two kinds, one of Indemonstrables,… the other of Demonstrables.
5. In the Western Church, A phrase, sentence, or verse introduced as an embellishment into some part of the text of the mass or of the breviary office that is sung by the choir.
(Tropes were discontinued at the revision of the missal under Pope Pius V. in the 16th cent.)
1846. Maskell, Mon. Rit., I. p. xxxvii. The Tropes … were … sung either before or after the Introit and Hymns in the service of the Mass.
1853. Rock, Ch. of Fathers, IV. xi. 21. A … practice … had … grown up … in the north and western quarters of Christendom … of weaving certain pious sentences, called by the Romans ‘festive praises,’ by the Franks ‘tropes,’ between the words of the psalm in the introit at mass.
1894. W. H. Frere, Winchester Troper, p. ix. ‘Trope’ … is the regular word to describe additions to the Introit, Offertory and Communion, and is also more rarely found in connection with the Ite missa est or Benedicamus at the close of Mass.
6. In the Moravian Church, One of the three divisions forming the ‘Unity of the Brethren.’
[1780. B. La Trobe, trans. Cranz’s Hist. Brethren, 355. In … 1749 … the administration of the Reformed tropus in the Unity of the Brethren was tendered to, and accepted by, the Bishop of Sodor and Man, Thomas Wilson.]
1809. Bogue & Bennett, Hist. Dissenters (1833), II. i. 64. The three different classes of persons who compose the unity, bear among the brethren the name of tropes or tropuses, from a Greek word which signifies modes of discipline.
7. In Greek Philosophy: see quots.
1866. Ferrier, Grk. Philos., I. xv. 467. Of these tropes or Sceptical arguments Sextus enumerates ten.
1910. R. D. Hicks, Stoic & Epicurean, 376. Ænesidemus undertook to arrange the whole material at the disposal of the Sceptic in his contention against the dogmatic position under ten heads or tropes. The word trope properly denotes procedure; the ten tropes were intended to contain the means of refuting dogmatism in all possible forms, and to provide directions for stating every line of available argument which could lead to negative conclusions and paralyse assent.
8. Geom. The reciprocal of a node on a curve or surface; in different cases, a multiple tangent or tangent plane, or a plane or developable surface touching the given surface in a particular way.
1869. Cayley, Math. Papers, VI. 330. Using ‘trope’ as the reciprocal term to node.
1875. [see TROPAL].
