Word of the Day

: October 19, 2023

quintessence

noun kwin-TESS-unss

What It Means

Quintessence is a formal word that can refer to the most typical or perfect example of something, or the most important part of something.

// Roasting marshmallows over an open fire and making s’mores is the quintessence of camping in the great outdoors.

// The quintessence of music is the melody.

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quintessence in Context

"The stories read like the quintessence of the human imagination in its densest, strangest form, as if his language were a thick, sweet concentrate of the creativity that other writers dilute to a sippable weakness. The comparison with Kafka misses much of [Bruno] Schulz’s surreal humour and vivacity; the writer of whom he reminds me most is Maurice Sendak, with his bewitching childhood worlds filled with galumphing, unpredictable adults." — Joe Moshenska, The Guardian (London), 14 May 2023

Did You Know?

Long ago, when people believed that everything was made up of four elements—earth, air, fire, and water—they thought the stars and planets were made up of yet another element. In the Middle Ages, people called this element by its Medieval Latin name, quinta essentia, literally, "fifth essence." They believed the quinta essentia was essential to all kinds of matter, and if they could somehow isolate it, it would cure all disease. People have since given up on that idea, but English users have kept quintessence, the offspring of quinta essentia, as a word for the purest essence of a thing. Some modern physicists have given quintessence a new twist—they use it to refer to a form of the dark energy believed to make up almost 70 percent of the energy in the observable universe.