The present research deals with the analysis of terms based on allusive reference and textual allusions found in technical and semi-technical texts in various fields, namely, economics, telecommunications and civil engineering. Most frequently allusion is defined as a kind of reference to a well-known work of literature, work of art, a historical figure, person, place, or event used to evoke certain associations. For the purposes of the present research we distinguish between lexicalised or dead and textual or genuine allusions following the principles of classification of metaphors suggested by Borges, who makes a clear distinction between dead and genuine metaphors. He defines dead metaphors as having lost their metaphoric potential partially or entirely and genuine metaphors as “metaphors that are felt as metaphors by the reader” (Borges 2002, 23). Such distinction between lexicalised and textual allusions is considered to be justified accepting the point of view that an allusion can be seen as a type of extended metaphor (cf. Skrebnev 2000). Both types of allusions are used in a technical text, however, the terms based on allusive reference acquire the status of a term only when they become lexicalised, that is, fixed in professional language and listed in dictionaries and glossaries of professional terms. Despite being lexicalised, such terms normally retain their allusive reference and are easily aligned across the languages. At the same time, textual allusions may potentially pose a translation problem, therefore, in the present article they are studied in contrastive perspective in order to determine whether they can be represented in translation without loss of meaning and stylistic colouring. The aims of the article are (1) to investigate lexicalised allusions used as terms; (2) to analyse textual allusions in contrastive perspective; (3) to study the mechanism of compression of information within allusions of both types. Allusions are based on the extension of meaning and, simultaneously, facilitate compression of information. Allusions encode a great amount of information expressed in one word or phrase. It is one of the most useful mechanisms promoting the principle of linguistic economy.