From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.44 [gcide]:
Specimen \Spec"i*men\, noun [L., fr. specere to look, to behold. See {Spy}.] A part, or small portion, of anything, or one of a number of things, intended to exhibit the kind and quality of the whole, or of what is not exhibited; a sample; as, a specimen of a man's handwriting; a specimen of a person's blood; a specimen of painting; aspecimen of one's art. [1913 Webster +PJC]
Usage: {Specimen}, {Sample}. A specimen is a representative of the class of things to which it belongs; as, a specimen of photography. A sample is a part of the thing itself, designed to show the quality of the whole; as, a sample of sugar or of broadcloth. A cabinet of minerals consists of specimens; if a part be broken off from any one of these, it is a sample of the mineral to which it belongs. ''Several persons have exhibited specimens of this art before multitudes of beholders.'' --Addison. ''I design this but for a sample of what I hope more fully to discuss.'' --Woodward.
From WordNet (r) 2.0 [wn]:
noun
1: an example regarded as typical of its class
2: a bit of tissue or blood or urine that is taken for diagnostic purposes; "they collected a urine specimen for urinalysis"
From Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0 [moby-thes]:
27 Moby Thesaurus words for "specimen": case, case history, case in point, cross section, embodiment, example, exemplar, exponent, illustration, instance, little bite, little smack, model, pattern, piece, representation, representative, sample, sampling, sort, species, swatch, taste, taster, type, typification, variety
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