apotheosis

American  

[uh-poth-ee-oh-sis, ap-uh-thee-uh-sis] / əˌpɒθ iˈoʊ sɪs, ˌæp əˈθi ə sɪs /

noun

• apotheoses
  plural

1. the elevation or exaltation of a person to the rank of a god.

2. the ideal example; epitome; quintessence.

   This poem is the apotheosis of lyric expression.

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apotheosis British  

/ əˌpɒθɪˈəʊsɪs /

noun

1. the elevation of a person to the rank of a god; deification

2. glorification of a person or thing

3. a glorified ideal

4. the best or greatest time or event

   the apotheosis of De Niro's career

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• apotheoses
  plural

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Etymology

Origin of apotheosis

1570–80; < Late Latin < Greek. See apo-, theo-, -osis

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Explanation

If your teacher says the term paper you handed in last week is a work of genius that sets a new gold standard for the school, he's telling you your work is the apotheosis of term papers. The epitome. Perfection. Hidden in the middle of apotheosis you'll find the Greek theos, meaning god. (Theology, the study of religion, has the same root.) Combine theos with apo "from" and you get a person, place, or thing that is so out-of-this-world amazing that it seems as if it's "from God." It's divine. You could make the assertion that Leonardo da Vinci was the apotheosis of genius and that the Mona Lisa is the apotheosis of all his paintings.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

apotheosis apotheoses

The Portuguese design genius for mixing the pious with playfully overelaborated touches reaches its apotheosis at this Unesco World Heritage site—Portugal’s equivalent of France’s monumental Cathedral of Chartres.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 27, 2026

Borglum believed the American political system was the apotheosis of human civilization, and he wanted his sculpture to stand alongside the Parthenon and pyramids as testaments to grand civilizations and cultures.

From Slate ● Mar. 13, 2025

This revisionist history reached its apotheosis with a 2007 essay collection edited by the historians Kenneth T. Jackson and Hilary Ballon.

From Slate ● Sep. 16, 2024

Sunset Sound represents the apotheosis of the recording industry’s heyday.

From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 20, 2024

He was no ordinary scholar, this man, but the apotheosis of scholars: the most famous personage in Zosma, save the queen and the hierarch, and the most popular, bar none.

From "Strange the Dreamer" by Laini Taylor

And the things it forgets, the apotheoses and apocalypses it lets sift through its mesh!

From The Guardian ● Oct. 15, 2016

They are their own apotheoses, their own parodies.

From Time Magazine Archive

The result is that he has plenty of apotheoses.

From Napoleon the Little by Victor Hugo

Outraged public conscience extinguishes the fires of apotheoses such as these.

From Marie Antoinette and the Downfall of Royalty by Arthur Léon, baron Imbert de Saint-Amand

Posterity, infatuated with Pagan apotheoses, made of that simple martyrdom an interesting legend, colored with the myths of resurrection and ascension to that very heaven which the telescope has put out of man's way.

From Bible Myths and their Parallels in other Religions Being a Comparison of the Old and New Testament Myths and Miracles with those of the Heathen Nations of Antiquity Considering also their Origin and Meaning by T. W. Doane

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Related Words

• embodiment
• epitome
• exemplar
• ideal
• quintessence

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