Definition of "periphrases" []

• Plural form of periphrase. circumlocutions. (noun)
• Plural form of periphrasis. use of syntactic rather than morphological constructions. (noun)
• Third-person singular simple present indicative form of periphrase. (verb)

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• "He that hath complex ideas without names for them, wants liberty and dispatch in his expressions, and is necessitated to use periphrases."
• "For the several fashions, customs, and manners of one nation, making several combinations of ideas familiar and necessary in one, which another people have had never an occasion to make, or perhaps so much as take notice of, names come of course to be annexed to them, to avoid long periphrases in things of daily conversation; and so they become so many distinct complex ideas in their minds."
• "This feature of the song serves to explain its inordinate length, for a song may occupy the greater part of a night, apparently without tiring the audience by its verbose periphrases and its exuberant figures."