Word of the Day – Penultimate
We humans, even those who are not Twitter-addicted former US Presidents, love our superlatives. From time to time I hear this word in the context of something being more than ultimate. Some years back, a senior Canadian Army officer, started talking about “the penultimate sacrifice.” I recently heard the word used in a similar context in a report on CBC.
Well guess what? By definition, nothing can be more than ultimate; whereas penultimate actually means “second last,” as in “The murderer’s identity was revealed in the penultimate episode of Season 3.” It’s a fancy word to describe second last, but there it is. Don’t take my word for it, a dictionary definition is just a click away. Always question, always check!
Thanks for the ultimate comment on this word. I recall the incident you refer to, and how within a short time of hearing that speech, many other officers began using the same word … incorrectly. Sigh. I used this example as a lesson with my students on the importance of understanding words, and then introduced antepenultimate and preantepenultimate …