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Definitions

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

  1. n. The pure, highly concentrated essence of a thing.
  2. n. The purest or most typical instance: the quintessence of evil.
  3. n. In ancient and medieval philosophy, the fifth and highest essence after the four elements of earth, air, fire, and water, thought to be the substance of the heavenly bodies and latent in all things.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

  1. n. The fifth essence, or fifth body, not composed of earth, water, fire, or air; the substance of the heavenly bodies, according to Aristotle, who seems in this matter to follow Pythagorean doctrine. The quintessence was situated above the four terrestrial elements, and was naturally bright and incorruptible, and endowed with a circular motion.
  2. n. Hence An extract from anything, containing its virtues or most essential part in a small quantity; pure and concentrated essence; the best and purest part of a thing; in old chemistry, an alcoholic tincture or essence often made by digestion at common temperatures or in the sun's heat, and always at a gentle heat.
  3. To extract as a quintessence; reduce to a quintessence.

Wiktionary

  1. n. A thing that is the most perfect example of its type; the most perfect embodiment of something.
  2. n. A pure substance.
  3. n. The essence in a thing that in its purest and most concentrated form.
  4. n. alchemy The fifth alchemical element, or essence, after earth, air, fire, and water

GNU Webster's 1913

  1. n. obsolete The fifth or last and highest essence or power in a natural body. See Ferment oils, under ferment.
  2. n. Hence: An extract from anything, containing its rarest virtue, or most subtle and essential constituent in a small quantity; pure or concentrated essence.
  3. n. The most characteristic form or most perfect example of some type of object.
  4. v. rare To distil or extract as a quintessence; to reduce to a quintessence.

WordNet 3.0

  1. n. the fifth and highest element after air and earth and fire and water; was believed to be the substance composing all heavenly bodies
  2. n. the most typical example or representative of a type
  3. n. the purest and most concentrated essence of something

Etymologies

  1. Middle English, from Middle French, from Medieval Latin quinta essentia "fifth essence". (Wiktionary)
  2. Middle English, from Old French quinte essence, fifth essence, from Medieval Latin quīnta essentia (translation of Greek pemptē ousiā) : Latin quīnta, feminine of quīntus, fifth; see penkwe in Indo-European roots + Latin essentia, essence; see essence. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)

Examples

  • “That's what I call the quintessence of domestic economy.”

    Bill Arp from the uncivil war to date, 1861-1903,

  • “Astrophysicists and cosmologists have resorted to the term quintessence to describe the mysterious "dark matter" that appears to be accelerating the expansion of the universe.”

    Architecture and Memory: The Renaissance Studioli of Federico da Montefeltro

  • “Malvinas Islands, in reiterating its support of the inalienable right of the people of Belize to self-determination, independence and territorial integrity, the conference again confirmed that which its declaration defined as the quintessence of nonalinement.”

    MEETS OFFICIALS AT UN:DEPARTS FOR HOME

  • “What a thing to say: "I have achieved eumoiriety," -- namely the quintessence of happy-fatedness dealt unto oneself by a perfect altruism!”

    Simon the Jester

  • “It has an odour which I can only describe as the quintessence of onions, but this is concentrated in the rind.”

    Insulinde: Experiences of a Naturalist's Wife in the Eastern Archipelago

  • “Daughters of St. Francis of Sales, on the occasion of their Tercentenary, give to the English-speaking world a work which, in its wise curtailment and still full detail, may be called the quintessence of the Spirit of their Master, the Founder of their Institute.”

    The Spirit of St. Francis de Sales

  • “Funny how, in an article about a violent religious conflict (which liberals describe as the quintessence of religion), only one of the religions is named.”

    Latest Articles

  • “Although the four-elements paradigm remained robust throughout antiquity and through the Middle Ages (during which a mystical tradition emerged proposing a fifth element, ruling the others, the socalled quintessence), atomism fell out of favor for nearly two millennia until the quantitative philosophy of the early Enlightenment created a conceptual environment friendly to the metamorphosis of alchemy, through the chemical experiments of Robert Hooke,”

    Verbatim: VERBATIM: The Language Quarterly Vol XXIII No 4

  • “How could this boy from Brooklyn, this New Yorker in heart and mind, this supermale with six marriages, this man whom the feminist Kate Millett called the quintessence of the heterosexual, macho pig — how could this man have chosen to live in a small town of 3,500 souls, most of them homosexuals, whose contribution to local culture consists (if I am to believe the waiter in the faux fisherman's restaurant where I wait till it's time for our interview) of a festival of sexy bodies, a week for leather enthusiasts, and a colloquium on the problems posed by adoption by same-sex couples?”

    In the Footsteps of Tocqueville (Part V)

  • “Perhaps not domes, but certainly complete spheres, made of "quintessence", in which the planets and the sun and moon were embedded.”

    The Last Gasp of Inerrancy

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synonyms (1)

Words with the same meaning

  1. paradigm

hypernyms (21)

Words that are more generic or abstract

  1. element
  2. representative
  3. illustration
  4. example
  1. instance
  2. nub
  3. essence
  4. heart and soul
  1. heart
  2. inwardness
  3. centre
  4. sum
  1. gist
  2. nitty-gritty
  3. kernel
  4. center
  1. substance
  2. pith
  3. meat
  4. core
  1. marrow

same context (2)

Words that are found in similar contexts

  1. brimful
  1. epitome

rhymes (10)

Words with the same terminal sound

  1. acquiescence
  2. adolescence
  1. coalescence
  2. convalescence
  1. essence
  2. evanescence
  1. luminescence
  2. obsolescence
  1. phosphorescence
  2. senescence

reverse dictionary (8)

Words that contain this word in their definition

  1. quintessence
  1. quintessential
  1. essence
  1. elixir
  1. quintessentialize
  1. cream
  1. archetype
  1. pith

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  • janejetson 5th element Feb 27, 2010

  • simonjamesc 'How infinite in faculties! In form and moving, how express and admirable! In action how like an angel! In apprehension how like a god! The beauty of the world. The paragon of animals! And yet, to me, what is this quintessence of dust?
    - Hamlet, Prince of Denmark Jul 11, 2009

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‘quintessence’ has been looked up 3995 times, loved by 28 people, added to 105 lists, commented on 2 times, and has a Scrabble score of 23.