ultimate
The most basic or fundamental of a set of things
Adjective
- Final; last in a series.
- […] they [the sounds of an echo] next strike the ultimate secondary object, then the penultimate and antepenultimate; […] - 1677, Robert Plot, “Of the Heavens and Air”, in The natural history of Oxford-shire: Being an...
Synonyms: conclusive last terminal extreme final decisive definitive endly endsome hindermost hindmost ultimate
- Last in a word or other utterance.
- Being the greatest possible; maximum; most extreme.
- the ultimate pleasure
- the ultimate disappointment
- Not that we consider this as the most desirable channel in which these affections should be made to flow. The good that is done in this way, is by no means in proportion to the good that is intended. Injudicious charity...
Synonyms: supreme utmost uttermost extreme ferocious exquisite intense almighty greatest highest maximal maximum passing raging ultimate
Antonyms: original derivative
- Being the most distant or extreme; farthest.
- That will happen at some time; eventual.
Synonyms: inevitable
- Last in a train of progression or consequences; tended toward by all that precedes; arrived at, as the last result; final.
- those ultimate truths and those universal laws of thought which we cannot rationally contradict - 1825, S[amuel] T[aylor] Coleridge, Aids to Reflection in the Formation of a Manly Character on the Several Grounds of...
- Incapable of further analysis; incapable of further division or separation; constituent; elemental.
- an ultimate constituent of matter
Origin
* From Medieval Latin ultimātus (“furthest, last”), perfect passive participle of ultimō (“to come to an end”) (see -ate (1,2 and 3)), from ultimus (“last, final”) + -ō (verb-forming suffix). See ultra-. * (ultimate frisbee): The sport was renamed to avoid the use of the Frisbee trademark.
Forms
Related
Derived
antepenultimate pay the ultimate price penultimate super-ultimate ultimateness ultimate sacrifice ultimate tensile strength ultimate wheel
Noun
- The most basic or fundamental of a set of things
- The final or most distant point; the conclusion
- The greatest extremity; the maximum
- Ellipsis of ultimate frisbee or ultimate disc.
Forms
Verb
- To finish; to complete.
- These measures have been carried forward with a zeal and unanimity that warrant the hope we entertain, of ultimating the plans in respect to our Temple, before the next meeting of the Maryland Association. - 1869, The...