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Gargantua is the name of a giant king in François Rabelais's 16th-century satiric novel Gargantua, the second part of a five-volume series about the giant and his son Pantagruel. All of the details of Gargantua's life befit a giant. He rides a colossal mare whose tail switches so violently that it fells the entire forest of Orleans. He has an enormous appetite, such that in one incident he inadvertently swallows five pilgrims while eating a salad. The scale of everything connected with Gargantua led to the adjective gargantuan, which since William Shakespeare's time has been used for anything of tremendous size or volume.
Examples of gargantuan in a Sentence
Nina E. Cerfolio, Los Angeles Times, 25 Apr. 2025
Append to this figure the $13 trillion in disposable income that is believed to encompass the disability community and their allies, and a gargantuan market opportunity reveals itself.
—Gus Alexiou, Forbes.com, 25 Apr. 2025
Chinese e-commerce sites such as Shein, Temu and Aliexpress have built their gargantuan business models around de minimis shipments.
—Ramishah Maruf, CNN Money, 11 Apr. 2025
Resident Evil: Extinction (2007) Of the six existing Resident Evil movies, Extinction is perhaps the most recognizable, thanks to that scene where Project Alice (Milla Jovovich) turns a sky filled with zombie crows into a gargantuan, swirling halo of fire.
—Jordan Crucchiola, Vulture, 4 Apr. 2025
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Cite this Entry
“Gargantuan.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/gargantuan. Accessed 29 Apr. 2025.
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gargantuan
adjective
from Gargantua, a giant with an enormous appetite in books by the French author François Rabelais
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