n. The mental capacity of retaining unconscious traces of conscious impressions or states, and of recalling these traces to consciousness with the attendant perception that they (or their objects) have a certain relation to the past; in a narrower sense, the power of such retention alone, the power or act of recalling being termed recollection.n. The fact of retaining such mental impressions; remembrance; mental hold on the past; retrospect; recollection.n. Length of time included in the conscious experience or observation of an individual, a community, or any succession of persons; the period of time during which the acquisition of knowledge is possible.n. The state of being remembered; continued presence in the minds or thoughts of men; retained or perpetuated knowledge; posterior note or reputation: as, to celebrate the memory of a great event.n. That which is remembered; anything fixed in or recalled to the mind; a mental impression; a reminiscence: as, pleasant memories of travel.n. That which brings to mind; a memento or memorial; a remembrancer.n. Commemoration; perpetuation of the knowledge of anything; a recalling to mind: as, a monument erected in memory of a person.n. An act or ceremony of remembrance; a service for the dead: same as commemoration, 2 .n. = Syn. 1-4. Memory, Recollection, Remembrance, Reminiscence. Memory is the general word for the faculty or capacity itself; recollection and remembrance are different kinds of exercise of the faculty; reminiscence, also, is used for the exercise of the faculty, but less commonly, and then it stands for the least energetic use of it, the matter seeming rather to be suggested to the mind. The correctness of the use of memory for that which is remembered has been disputed. The others are freely used for that which is remembered. In either sense, recollection implies more effort, more detail, and more union of objects in wholes, than remembrance. Reminiscence is used chiefly of past events, rarely of thoughts, words, or scenes, while recollection is peculiarly appropriate for the act of recalling mental operations. See remember.n. Memory as mediated by kinesthetic images in the narrower sense.