Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Being the best or truest of a kind; quintessential: a diplomat par excellence.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. By virtue of manifest superiority; by the highest right, claim, or qualification; preëminently.
Wiktionary
- adj. Being the best of its kind.
- adj. Being a quintessential example of the kind in question.
WordNet 3.0
- adv. to a degree of excellence
Etymologies
- Borrowed from French par excellence ("by excellence"). (Wiktionary)
- French : par, by + excellence, preeminence. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“A potential friendly witness par excellence — next to Chaz Minear, the Red with the most closeted skeletons.”
“It was either on account of the secrecy of their meetings, or because of some mystical idea which made the middle of the night the hour par excellence for prayer, in the words of the psalm: media nocte surgebam ad confitendum tibi, that the Christians chose the night time for their synaxes, and of all other nights, preferably the”
“It is these permanent French Canadian immigrants who have organized parishes and parochial schools, erected churches and convents, and now constitute the labouring power par excellence in all the industrial centres of New England.”
The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume 6: Fathers of the Church-Gregory XI
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘par excellence’.
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English with Tongue
French words and phrases used by English speakers.
objet d'art, nom de plume, petite, bon voyage, avant-garde, faux pas, faux, touché, répondez, s'il vo..., rouge, papier mâché, joie de vivre and 85 more...
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