pinacle

Noun

pinnacle (plural pinnacles)

1. The highest point.

   Synonyms:

   acme, peak, summit, zenith

   Antonyms:

   nadir

2. A tall, sharp and craggy rock or mountain.
   • Kings, who remain in many respects the representatives of a vanished world, solitary pinnacles that topple over the rising waste of waters under which the past lies buried.1900, James George Frazer, The Golden Bough, volume 2, page 55
3. (figuratively) An all-time high; a point of greatest achievement or success.
   • The pinnacle of the effort to fix restrictive meanings to a set of terminology can be found in two papers in American Speech by Feinsilver (1979, 1980).2018, James Lambert, “A multitude of ‘lishes’: The nomenclature of hybridity”, in English World-Wide, page 7

   Synonyms:

   acme, apex, zenith, apogee, apotheosis, ascendance, capstone, climax, coronation, crown

4. An upright member, generally ending in a small spire, used to finish a buttress, to constitute a part in a proportion, as where pinnacles flank a gable or spire.
   • Some renowned metropolis / With glistering spires and pinnacles around.1667, John Milton, “Book III”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished...

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