rebus

The effect of these lines, which reach back into the past while projecting far into the future, is that of a rebus, with the stunning phrase “the final whereabouts” offering one more breath of indirection.

From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 22, 2022

A modern-day equivalent would be using a picture of an eye to represent “I” — a linguistic concept called the rebus principle.

From Washington Post ● Sep. 30, 2019

Slogans, drawings, GIFs, inspirational sentiments, little rebus puzzles—it’s really up to you.

From Slate ● Feb. 5, 2018

Follow Plautus’s famous injunction: modus omnibus in rebus.

From New York Times ● Apr. 8, 2016

Logograms for abstract words were often derived by the rebus principle.

From "Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies" by Jared M. Diamond

I grew up doing crosswords, riddles and rebuses.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 28, 2025

Photograph: Universal Images Group/Getty Images In essence, Griffiths had to crack an elaborate Tudor code of rebuses, ciphers, heraldic motifs and symbolic flowers to discover who the man was.

From The Guardian ● May 19, 2015

More complex rebuses are pictures whose elements, correctly named and put together, make up words or sentences.

From Time Magazine Archive

Perhaps I should compose some rebuses for the King.

From Voices from the Past by Paul Alexander Bartlett

I sometimes indulged my fancy in writing verses, or composing rebuses, and my governess never failed to applaud the juvenile compositions I presented to her.

From Beaux and Belles of England Mrs. Mary Robinson, Written by Herself, With the lives of the Duchesses of Gordon and Devonshire by Mary Robinson