Word.ws English Dictionary

hyperbata

hyperbata is the plural of hyperbaton.

Meaning of hyperbaton

Noun

hyperbaton (plural hyperbatons or hyperbata)

  1. An inversion of the usual or logical order of words or phrases, for emphasis or poetic effect.
    • In real life we often see a man under the influence of rage, or fear, […] begin a sentence, and then swerve aside into some inconsequent parenthesis, and then again double back to his original statement […]Now the figure hyperbaton is the means which is employed by the best writers to imitate these...c. 100, Longinus, chapter XXII, in H. L. Havell, transl., On the Sublime, published 1890
  2. (rhetoric) Adding a word or thought to a sentence that is already semantically complete, thus drawing emphasis to the addition.

Questions about hyperbata

What is hyperbata the plural of?
Hyperbata is the plural of hyperbaton.

Words near hyperbata in the dictionary

  1. hyperbasophilia
  2. hyperbasophilic
  3. hyperbass
  4. hyperbass flute
  5. hyperbass flutes
  6. hyperbata
  7. hyperbatic
  8. hyperbatically
  9. hyperbaton
  10. hyperbatons
  11. hyperbeam

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: hyperbata (page history and authors); hyperbaton (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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