Word.ws English Dictionary

hypostrophe

hypostrophe noun: the act of a patient turning himself or herself.

Noun

hypostrophe (countable and uncountable, plural hypostrophes)

  1. (obsolete) The act of a patient turning himself or herself.
  2. (obsolete) A relapse; a return of a disease.
    • Whenever the temperature remains elevated, however slightly, and generally when the temperature rises still more, we may confidently assume that the healing process is yet incomplete, or that a fresh malady, a sequela, or a hypostrophe is being developed.1871, C. A. Wunderlich, “The Course of the Temperature in Febrile Diseases” (chapter 11), in W. Bathurst Woodman, transl., On the Temperature in Diseases: A Manual of Medical Thermometry, London: New...
  3. (rhetoric) A return to the main theme following an insertion or parenthesis.
    • In addition, the initial σὺ of line 14 completes the series in 6 and 12, providing an extended epanaphora through the mid-section of II, and supplies a slight hypostrophe (catches up the thread of the narrative after a parenthesis and makes a fresh start by either repeating the subject or adding a...1990, Daniel J. Sheerin, “The Anaphora of the Liturgy of St John Chrysostom: Stylistic Notes” (chapter 3), in David Jasper, R. C. D. Jasper, editors, Language and the Worship of the Church, London...

Forms of hypostrophe

pluralhypostrophes

Origin of hypostrophe

From Ancient Greek ὑποστροφή (hupostrophḗ), from ὑποστρέφω (hupostréphō, “to turn round or back”).

Questions about hypostrophe

What does hypostrophe mean?
Hypostrophe means the act of a patient turning himself or herself.
What part of speech is hypostrophe?
Hypostrophe is a noun.
What is the plural of hypostrophe?
The plural of hypostrophe is hypostrophes.

Words near hypostrophe in the dictionary

  1. hypostratotypes
  2. hypostress
  3. hypostria
  4. hypostriid
  5. hypostriids
  6. hypostrophe
  7. hypostrophes
  8. hypostyle
  9. hypostyles
  10. hyposuccinylate
  11. hyposuccinylated

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: hypostrophe (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: “hypostrophe.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/hypostrophe. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.