Eponym vs. Homonym — What's the Difference?

An eponym is a person, place, or thing after whom or which someone or something is, or is believed to be, named. The adjectives derived from eponym include eponymous and eponymic.

In linguistics, homonyms, broadly defined, are words which are homographs (words that share the same spelling, regardless of pronunciation) or homophones (words that share the same pronunciation, regardless of spelling), or both. For example, according to this definition, the words row (propel with oars), row (argument) and row (a linear arrangement) are homonyms, as are the words see (vision) and sea (body of water).

A word or name derived from a proper noun. The words atlas, bowdlerize, denim, and Turing machine are eponyms.

Each of two or more words having the same spelling or pronunciation but different meanings and origins.

One whose name is or is thought to be the source of the name of something

One of two or more words that have the same sound and often the same spelling but differ in meaning, such as bank (embankment) and bank (place where money is kept).

A real or fictitious person's name that has given rise to the name of a particular item.

A word used to designate several different things.

A word formed from a real or fictive person’s name.

A namesake.

A word formed from a real or fictive place or thing.

(Biology) A taxonomic name identical to one previously applied to a different species or other taxon and therefore unacceptable in its new use.

The hypothetical individual who is assumed as the person from whom any race, city, etc., took its name; as, Hellen is an eponym of the Hellenes.

A word that both sounds and is spelled the same as another word.

A name, as of a people, country, and the like, derived from that of an individual.

(loosely) A word that sounds or is spelled the same as another word (but not necessarily both), technically called a homophone (same sound, different spelling) or a homograph (same spelling, different sound), or if both are the same, a homonym.

The name of a person for whom something is supposedly named;

(taxonomy) A name for a taxon that is identical in spelling to another name that belongs to a different taxon.

A name derived from the name of person (real or imaginary) as the name of Alexandria is derived from the name of its founder: Alexander the Great

A word having the same sound as another, but differing from it in meaning; as the noun bear and the verb bear.

Two words are homonyms if they are pronounced or spelled the same way but have different meanings