Word.ws English Dictionary

came to a head

came to a head is the simple past of come to a head.

Meaning of come to a head

Verb

come to a head (third-person singular simple present comes to a head, present participle coming to a head, simple past came to a head, past participle come to a head)

  1. (idiomatic, intransitive) To rapidly reach a turning point or climax.
    • The escalating crisis between England and her American colonies came to a head when fighting broke out in 1775.
  2. (idiomatic, intransitive) To suddenly reveal itself, having lain latent for a time.
    • His festering anger came to a head after the incident.
  3. (idiomatic, intransitive) To suddenly become mature or perfected, having been inchoate or imperfectly formed.
  4. (intransitive) To reach its final stage.

Questions about came to a head

What is came to a head the simple past of?
Came to a head is the simple past of come to a head.

Words near came to a head in the dictionary

  1. came thick and fast
  2. came through
  3. came to
  4. came to a boil
  5. came to a close
  6. came to a head
  7. came to a sticky end
  8. came to a stop
  9. came to an end
  10. came to anchor
  11. came to bat

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: came to a head (page history and authors); come to a head (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “came to a head.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/came_to_a_head. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.