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Shadow vs Wraith - What's the difference?

shadow | wraith | Related terms |

As nouns the difference between shadow and wraith

is that shadow is a dark projected onto a surface where light (or other radiation) is blocked by the shade of an object while wraith is a ghost or specter, especially seen just after a person's death.

As a verb shadow

is to block light or radio transmission.

shadow

English

(wikipedia shadow)

Noun

(en noun)
  • A dark image projected onto a surface where light (or other radiation) is blocked by the shade of an object.
  • *
  • , title=(The Celebrity), chapter=1 , passage=The stories did not seem to me to touch life. […] They left me with the impression of a well-delivered stereopticon lecture, with characters about as life-like as the shadows on the screen, and whisking on and off, at the mercy of the operator.}}
  • Relative darkness, especially as caused by the interruption of light; gloom, obscurity.
  • * Denham
  • Night's sable shadows from the ocean rise.
  • * Spenser
  • In secret shadow from the sunny ray, / On a sweet bed of lilies softly laid.
  • (obsolete) A reflected image, as in a mirror or in water.
  • (Shakespeare)
  • That which looms as though a shadow.
  • *
  • Hepaticology, outside the temperate parts of the Northern Hemisphere, still lies deep in the shadow' cast by that ultimate "closet taxonomist," Franz Stephani—a ghost whose ' shadow falls over us all.
  • A small degree; a shade.
  • * Bible, James i. 17
  • no variableness, neither shadow of turning
  • An imperfect and faint representation.
  • He came back from war the shadow of a man.
  • * Bible, Hebrews x. 1
  • the law having a shadow of good things to come
  • * Milton
  • [types] and shadows of that destined seed
  • One who secretly or furtively follows another.
  • * Milton
  • Sin and her shadow Death
  • A type of lettering form of word processors that makes a cubic effect.
  • An influence, especially a pervasive or a negative one.
  • *
  • A spirit; a ghost; a shade.
  • * Shakespeare
  • Hence, horrible shadow !
  • (obsolete, Latinism) An uninvited guest accompanying one who was invited.
  • (Nares)

    Usage notes

    * A person (or object) is said to "cast", "have", or "throw" a shadow if that shadow is caused by the person (either literally, by eclipsing a light source, or figuratively). The shadow may then be described as the shadow "cast" or "thrown" by the person, or as the shadow "of" the person, or simply as the person's shadow.

    Derived terms

    * backshadowing * foreshadowing * rain shadow * shadow acting * shadow boxing * shadow cabinet * shadow government * shadow minister * shadow play * shadow price * sideshadowing * unshadow

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To block light or radio transmission.
  • Looks like that cloud's going to shadow us.
  • (espionage) To secretly or discreetly track or follow another, to keep under surveillance.
  • To accompany a professional during the working day, so as to learn about an occupation one intends to take up.
  • (programming) To make an identifier, usually a variable, inaccessible by declaring another of the same name within the scope of the first.
  • (computing) To apply the shadowing process to (the contents of ROM).
  • Derived terms

    * overshadow

    wraith

    English

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • A ghost or specter, especially seen just after a person's death.
  • * '>citation
  • * {{quote-book
  • , year=1917 , year_published=2008 , edition=HTML , editor= , author=Edgar Rice Burroughs , title=A Princess of Mars , chapter= citation , genre= , publisher=The Gutenberg Project , isbn= , page= , passage=We might indeed have been the wraiths of the departed dead upon the dead sea of that dying planet for all the sound or sign we made in passing. }}
  • * {{quote-book, passage=Like wraiths with the impediments of bodies they stumbled in the direction of Salthill faces.
  • , title=Middle Age: A Romance , year=2001 , author= , publisher=Fourth Estate , edition=paperback , page=80}} '>citation '>citation '>citation '>citation

    Synonyms

    * See also

    Derived terms

    * wraithish * wraithful * wraithlike

    See also

    * (wikipedia "wraith")