Word.ws English Dictionary

come to a head

come to a head verb: to rapidly reach a turning point or climax.

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.
    • In retrospect, it was small wonder that Railtrack found its finances under pressure, as with ever increasing demand there was an inevitable effect on infrastructure renewals. Matters came to a head with the Hatfield accident on October 17 2000, when there was a high-speed derailment as a result of...2024 January 10, 'Industry Insider', “Success built on liberalisation and market freedom”, in RAIL, number 1000, page 69
  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.

come to a head meaning in Tamil and Malayalam

come to a head in Tamil

பழு

come to a head in Malayalam

reach a crisis, come to a climax, reach a critical point
മൂർദ്ധന്യത്തിലെത്തുക, പരമകാഷ്ഠയിലെത്തുക, നേരിട്ടേമതിയാകൂ എന്ന നിലയിലെത്തുക, പാരമ്യത്തിലെത്തുക, വിഷമസന്ധിയിലെത്തുക, നിർണ്ണായനിമിഷത്തിലെത്തുക

Forms of come to a head

third-person singular presentcomes to a head
present participlecoming to a head
pastcame to a head
past participlecome to a head
alternative formbring to a head

Questions about come to a head

What does come to a head mean?
Come to a head means to rapidly reach a turning point or climax.
What is come to a head in Tamil?
Come to a head in Tamil is பழு. See Come to a head meaning in Tamil.
What part of speech is come to a head?
Come to a head is a verb.
What is the past tense of come to a head?
The past tense of come to a head is came to a head.

Words near come to a head in the dictionary

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

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: come to a head (page history and authors); come to a head (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); come to a head (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license). 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.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-au-come to a head.ogg.

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