Definition of tropes:
(n) :
(art, literature) Something recurring across a genre or type of art or literature; a motif.
(n) :
(medieval Christianity) An addition (of dialogue, song, music, etc.) to a standard element of the liturgy, serving as an embellishment.
(n) :
(rhetoric) A figure of speech in which words or phrases are used with a nonliteral or figurative meaning, such as a metaphor.
(n) :
(geometry) Mathematical senses.
(n) :
A tangent space meeting a quartic surface in a conic.
(n) :
(music) Musical senses.