colossus

American  

[kuh-los-uhs] / kəˈlɒs əs /

noun

• colossi,
  plural
• colossuses
  plural

1. (initial capital letter) the legendary bronze statue of Helios at Rhodes.

2. any statue of gigantic size.

3. anything colossal, gigantic, or very powerful.

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colossus British  

/ kəˈlɒsəs /

noun

1. something very large, esp a statue

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• colossi
  plural
• colossuses
  plural

Etymology

Origin of colossus

1350–1400; Middle English < Latin < Greek kolossós statue, image, presumably < a pre-Hellenic Mediterranean language

Explanation

The original colossus was an enormous statue that was supposed to have guarded the ancient Greek island and city of Rhodes. Now, though, we use the noun colossus for someone of huge importance, reputation, or influence. In the world of American music, Louis Armstrong is a colossus. He invented or perfected many of the elements of what we now call jazz — there's probably no figure of greater importance in that field. Even the second most important athlete in the world seems small in comparison to the colossus that is Muhammad Ali. He is, quite simply, the greatest. In the ancient world, Rome was an imperial colossus. Few nations could rival its strength, size, or colossal growth.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

colossus colossi colossuses

Spanish football commentator Alvaro Romeo says three years ago Araujo was "a colossus" during Barca's title-winning run.

From BBC ● Aug. 10, 2026

Only then do we see this dark colossus for the slight creature he always was.

From Salon ● Aug. 2, 2026

Paramount is the smallest of the major media companies and acquiring Warner Bros. is key to David Ellison’s ambitions to build a new Hollywood colossus.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 15, 2026

The driven, unrelenting oil executive remade Exxon into a colossus that for a time was the world’s biggest and most profitable company.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 16, 2026

The colossus of Wagner is an inescapable reality of late-nineteenth- century music, indeed of recent Western civilisation.

From "The Story of Music" by Howard Goodall

While those football colossi dreamed of taking over the U.S. market, American sports owners took over the powerhouses.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 5, 2026

His analysis focused on Shadow of the Colossus, which features a wanderer who travels on horseback to defeat giant beasts known as colossi.

From Salon ● Nov. 13, 2021

The newly unearthed city is located between the temple of King Rameses III and the colossi of Amenhotep III on the west bank of the Nile River in Luxor.

From Washington Times ● Apr. 9, 2021

These glitz-free, idiomatic churches of sweat and sparring - where age-old ring knowledge nurtured colossi such as Sugar Ray Robinson, Jake LaMotta and Riddick Bowe - were already on shaky legs prior to lockdown.

From BBC ● Jul. 14, 2020

The entrance to the temple lies deep down between the thrones of the colossi.

From The History of Antiquity, Vol. I (of VI) by Max Duncker

We had been impressed with brief stays in Rochester and Buffalo, two one-time commercial colossuses.

From New York Times ● Jul. 1, 2020

Investors are betting, in part, that the Covid-19 crisis accelerates the already growing power of America’s corporate colossuses.

From New York Times ● Apr. 28, 2020

Alisson and Van Dijk are two colossuses – big, confident people.

From The Guardian ● Jan. 14, 2020

But what makes the “Transformers” movies different from other blockbuster colossuses is Bay.

From Washington Times ● Jun. 20, 2017

What is to resist the combined power of these two colossuses unless the united weight and the united bulk of Germany hinders their embrace?

From Louisa of Prussia and Her Times by L. (Luise) Mühlbach