apotheosis
[uh-poth-ee-oh-sis, ap-uh-thee-uh-sis]
- the elevation or exaltation of a person to the rank of a god.
- the ideal example; epitome; quintessence: This poem is the apotheosis of lyric expression.
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Origin of apotheosis
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
Examples from the Web for apotheosis
Contemporary Examples
That transformation of the brand seems now to have its apotheosis in the arrival of the Tour de France.
Dance is a vehicle for personal expression, community storytelling, and the apotheosis of ceremony.
Challenging Religious Tradition for the Love of God — and the Love of DanceMoral Courage
June 16, 2014
If life has such a thing as an apotheosis, it surely involves truffled capon.
Over the course of these novels, the style becomes increasingly parsimonious, reaching its apotheosis in The Golden Bowl.
These triumphs were seen as the apotheosis of human enterprise and might.
Historical Examples
The little green serge curtain was then closed on this apotheosis.
My Double LifeSarah Bernhardt
He pronounced the panegyric of Robespierre, and the apotheosis of Marat.
Memoirs of the Court of St. Cloud, CompleteLewis Goldsmith
The old town of Cherbourg was experiencing its semi-weekly apotheosis.
The DestroyerBurton Egbert Stevenson
It is difficult to trace the origin of this new theology, the apotheosis of the Dog.
The apotheosis of these powers led to the conception of the first deity.
The Evolution of the DragonG. Elliot Smith
apotheosis
- the elevation of a person to the rank of a god; deification
- glorification of a person or thing
- a glorified ideal
- the best or greatest time or eventthe apotheosis of De Niro's career
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Word Origin
C17: via Late Latin from Greek: deification, from theos god
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Word Origin and History for apotheosis
n.
1600s, from Late Latin apotheosis "deification," from Greek apotheosis, from apotheoun "deify, make (someone) a god," from apo- special use of this prefix, meaning, here, "change" + theos "god" (see Thea).
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Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper