Icon

An icon - pronounced EYE-kon, IPA: /'aɪ kɒn/ - is an image. However, not all images are icons - a photograph or a representational painting presents us with an image of its subject, but this image cannot normally be referred to as an icon - and icons do not always bear a visual resemblance to what they represent. In contemporary English the word 'icon' is reserved for those images which not only represent their subject but have some further significance, e.g., are used for a particular purpose. Nowadays the word is most commonly used of

• religious images, especially the images of Jesus, Mary, or one of the saints, which are objects of devotion in the Eastern Orthodox Church. These icons are typically painted on a wooden panel in a distinctive Byzantine style - the figure is painted full face, has large eyes, and appears to be gazing at the viewer. (For more on icons in the Eastern Orthodox Church see Iconoclast.)

• a well-known person who, or object which, is regarded as representative or symbolic of a particular lifestyle, cultural movement, or period of history, and is admired (or reviled) as such. It is in this sense that a film star may be a sex icon or a model a fashion icon.

• an image on a computer screen. The icon represents a file or facility which can be opened or activated by clicking on the icon with the cursor.

While the adjective 'iconic' - pronounced with the stress on the second syllable - means 'relating to or having the character of an icon', it is most commonly used today of a well-known person who, or object which, is regarded as symbolic of a particular lifestyle, cultural movement, or period of history.

The English word 'icon' comes from the Greek εἰκών (eikon), which also means 'image'. (The alternative, but much less common, spellings of the English 'icon - namely 'ikon' and 'eikon' - reflect this etymology.) Like its English descendant, the Greek εἰκών had a number of more specific uses: it was used, e.g., of an image in a mirror, of a ghost or phantom (which resembles the dead person), and of mental images, as well as of comparisons or analogies (which usually have no visual resemblance to that of which they are an analogy.)

Etymological note: icon is an element used to create such words as iconoclast ('image-breaker'), iconographer, 'a writer or maker of images' and iconolatry, 'the worship of images'.