All 3 Uses of
purport
in
Moby Dick
- Now, by all odds, the most ancient extant portrait anyways purporting to be the whale's, is to be found in the famous cavern-pagoda of Elephanta, in India.†
Chpt 55-57 *purporting = claiming
- But quitting all these unprofessional attempts, let us glance at those pictures of leviathan purporting to be sober, scientific delineations, by those who know.†
Chpt 55-57
- In this book is an outline purporting to be a "Picture of a Physeter or Spermaceti whale, drawn by scale from one killed on the coast of Mexico, August, 1793, and hoisted on deck."†
Chpt 55-57
Definitions:
-
(1)
(purport as in: Her ex-husband purports that...) to claim -- (often said of something that is not easy to believe or is not true)
-
(2)
(purport as in: The purport of the letter was...) the general meaning, purpose, intent, or significance of something