Seme, the smallest unit of meaning recognized in Semantics, refers to a single characteristic of a sememe. These characteristics are defined according to the differences between sememes. The term was introduced by Eric Buyssens in the 1930s and developed by Bernard Pottier in the 1960s. It is the result produced when determining the minimal elements of meaning, which enables one to describe words multlingually. Such elements provide a bridge to component analysis and the initial work of ontologies.
