English

Noun

poecilonymy ‎(uncountable)

1. The use of several names for the same thing in the same document.
   • 1890, Univ. of Pennsylvania Medical Bulletin: Volume I-XXIII:

     Stated in technical linguistic terms, in this treatise poecilonymy is avoided; e. g., instead of taenia hippocampi in one place, corpus fimbriatum in another, and fimbria in a third, the last is consistently employed and the others given as synonyms.

   • 1893, The Nation - Volume 56, page 850:

     There are also too many relapses into poecilonymy; for example, on p. 758 occur appendix vermiformis, appendix, and rermiform appendix, whereas on p. 160 had already been introduced, without explanation, the very convenient contraction of the third term into vermix.

   • 2009, Dan G. McCartney, James (Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament), ISBN 1441206469:

     Based on distinctions by Philo (Alleg. Interp. 3.70 §§196–97), δόσις sometimes is seen as the act of giving and δώρημα as the thing given, but James may simply be using poecilonymy (a piling up of synonyms) to emphasize God's generosity, or he may be quoting an extant “saying” or expressing himself poetically.