From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishallegoryal‧le‧go‧ry /ˈæləɡəri $ -ɡɔːri/ noun (plural allegories) [countable, uncountable] STORYa story, painting etc in which the events and characters represent ideas or teach a moral lesson —allegorical /ˌæləˈɡɒrɪkəl $ -ˈɡɔːr-/ adjective —allegorically /-kli/ adverb
Examples from the Corpus
allegory• I painted the fire once as an allegory.• It was like living in an allegory.• "Animal Farm' is an allegory in which the animals represent the Russian people and Farmer Jones the old Tsarist regime.• An allegory may depart from everyday life into a make-believe world.• They look like Brueghel allegories of human suffering.• Perhaps the author is being satirical, employing irony, allegory, or ambiguity.• As in medieval allegory, multiple layers of meaning correspond to the novel's multiple languages.• The film was a dark, powerful allegory of life in post-war America.Origin allegory (1300-1400) Latin allegoria, from Greek, from allegorein “to speak allegorically”, from allos “other” + agorein “to speak publicly” 