In linguistics, a hyponym is a word belonging to a semantic field whose members all have a type-of or is-a relationship with another word known as a hypernym. Called hyponymy, this relationship connects a generic term (the hypernym) to a more specific instance of it (the hyponym).
In other words:
X is a hyponym of Y if every X is a type of Y.
For example, consider the hypernym transportation. A semantic field with a type-of relationship to transportation would be composed of types of more specific modes of travel. The hyponyms within this field would include boat, plane, train, horse, etc.
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