iconology

noun

ico·​nol·​o·​gy ˌī-kə-ˈnä-lə-jē 

: the study of icons or artistic symbolism

iconological

(ˌ)ī-ˌkä-nə-ˈlä-ji-kəl 

adjective

Word History

Etymology

icono- + -logy

Note: Outside English, the word has earlier counterparts with somewhat different senses. The Italian scholar Cesare Ripa (ca. 1555-1622) wrote an influential emblem book entitled Iconologia, overo descrittione dell'imagini universali cavate dall'antichita et da altri luoghi ("Iconology, or description of the univeral images drawn from antiquity and other places"), first published in Rome in 1593 and reprinted with illustrations in 1603; translations followed in French (Iconologie, ou, Explication de plusieurs images, emblemes, et autres figures hyerogliphiques, 1636) and in English (Iconologia: or, Moral Emblems, 1709). Compare also Greek eikonología "figurative speech."

First Known Use

circa 1736, in the meaning defined above