imprint
noun
- trade name under which works are published; a publishing division of a publishing company
- act of impressing or marking
verb
- impress or mark
Wiktionary
Pronunciation: /ˈɪm.pɹɪnt/ / /ɪmˈpɹɪnt/
noun
Etymology: Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *h₁én Proto-Italic *en Proto-Italic *en- Latin in- Proto-Indo-European *per-? Proto-Indo-European *pres-der. Proto-Italic *pres- Latin premō Latin imprimereder. Old French empreindre Old French empreinteder. English imprint From Old French empreinte, from the past participle of empreindre, from Latin imprimere.
- An impression; the mark left behind by printing something or by pressing on something, or the figurative counterpart of such a mark.
“Their footsteps left an imprint in the sand.”
“The packaging requires an imprint on three of its sides.”
- The name and details of a publisher or printer, as printed in a book etc.; (metonymic) the publisher, publishing house, or printer; their brand, or one of their subbrands.
“Near-synonyms: colophon, imprimatur”
“Each of the Big Five publishers has many imprints; for example, the imprints of Penguin Random House include Crown, DK, and Knopf Doubleday.”
- A distinctive marking, symbol, or logo.
“Near-synonyms: imprimatur, hallmark”
“The shirts bore the company imprint on the right sleeve.”
verb
Etymology: Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *h₁én Proto-Italic *en Proto-Italic *en- Latin in- Proto-Indo-European *per-? Proto-Indo-European *pres-der. Proto-Italic *pres- Latin premō Latin imprimereder. Old French empreindre Old French empreinterbor. Middle English emprinten English imprint From Middle English emprinten, enprinten, from Old French empreinter, from the past participle of empreindre, from Latin imprimere.
- To leave a print, impression, image, etc.
“For a fee, they can imprint the envelopes with a monogram.”
“For though a Child quickly aſſent to this Propoſition, That an Apple is not Fire; when, by familiar Acquaintance, he has got the Idea's of thoſe two different things diſtinctly imprinted on his Mind, and has learnt that the names Apple and Fire ſtand for them; yet it will be ſome years after, perhaps, before the ſame Child will aſſent to this Propoſition, That it is impoſſible for the ſame thing to be, and not to be.”
- To learn something indelibly at a particular stage of life, such as who one's parents are.
“Baby birds are known for a propensity to imprint; they tend to imprint on whichever creatures they perceive to be their parents — including humans doing wildlife rescue!”
“That is, by way of this initial imprinting the young animal becomes a socialized member of its species. Animals misimprinted to other species show a variety of abnormal social behaviors as adults.”
- To mark a gene as being from a particular parent so that only one of the two copies of the gene is expressed.