The first part of the article offers an historical overview of
metaphors, starting from Aristotle and the classical definition of
metaphor. Chomsky's contribution to cognitive psychology is also
mentioned together with Rosch’s and Kay and McDaniel’s research
concerning categorization. The end of the first part contains new
theories of metaphor, thus establishing the link to the second part,
which presents the last three
decades regarding metaphors in
cognitive linguistics, trying to highlight the revival of studies on
metaphor. The pervasiveness of metaphors cannot be overlooked in
human understanding, and the classical debate is also mentioned
(dead versus live metaphors). Our conclusion is that they offer an
insight into our everyday experience and may help us in exploring
the unknown
