peak
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: enpr: pēk
ipa: /piːk/
rhymes: -iːk
homophone: peek
homophone: peke
homophone: pique
Forms: form: peaks
Etymology: From earlier peake, peek, peke, from Middle English pek (in place names), itself an alteration of pike, pyke, pyk (“a sharp point, pike”), from Old English pīc, piic (“a pike, needle, pin, peak, pinnacle”), from Proto-West Germanic *pīk, from Proto-Germanic *pīkaz (“peak”).
Cognate with Dutch piek (“pike, point, summit, peak”), Danish pik (“pike, peak”), Swedish pik (“pike, lance, point, peak”), Norwegian pik (“peak, summit”). More at pike.
Senses: examples: text: A less risky method is to lift your whisk or beater to check the condition of the peaks of the egg whites; the foam should be just stiff enough to stand up in well-defined, unwavering peaks.
ref: 2002, Joy of Cooking: All About Cookies, →ISBN, page 29:
glosses: A point; the sharp end or top of anything that terminates in a point; as, the peak, or front, of a cap.
examples: text: The stock market reached a peak in September 1929.
text: By last year, family income was 8 percent lower than it had been 11 years earlier, at its peak in 2000, according to inflation-adjusted numbers from the Census Bureau.
ref: 2012 October 23, David Leonhardt, New York Times, retrieved 24 Oct 2012:
synonyms: word: apex
word: pinnacle
word: acme
word: apex
word: zenith
word: apogee
word: apotheosis
word: ascendance
word: capstone
word: climax
word: coronation
word: crown
word: culmination
word: Everest
word: extreme
word: fastigium
word: high note
word: high point
word: high tide
word: high-water mark
word: midday
word: outblossom
word: paroxysm
word: perihelion
word: pinnacle
word: summa
word: summit
glosses: The highest value reached by some quantity in a time period.
examples: text: They reached the peak after 8 hours of climbing.
topics: geography
natural-sciences
synonyms: summit
top
glosses: The top, or one of the tops, of a hill, mountain, or range, ending in a point.
examples: text: To the South we observed a large plain some ten miles wide, with snowy peaks rising on the farther side. In front was a hill projecting into the plain, on which stood a mani wall; and this latter discovery made me feel quite confident that I was on the high road to Lhassa.
ref: 1898, Arnold Henry Savage Landor, chapter 62, in In the Forbidden Land:
topics: geography
natural-sciences
glosses: The whole hill or mountain, especially when isolated.
topics: business
clothing
fashion
lifestyle
manufacturing
textiles
glosses: visor (horizontal part of a cap sticking out in front and shading the wearer's eyes)
examples: text: peak-halyards
text: peak-brails
topics: nautical
transport
glosses: The upper aftermost corner of a fore-and-aft sail.
topics: nautical
transport
glosses: The narrow part of a vessel's bow, or the hold within it.
topics: nautical
transport
glosses: The extremity of an anchor fluke; the bill.
topics: mathematics
sciences
glosses: A local maximum of a function, e.g. for sine waves, each point at which the value of y is at its maximum.
examples: there's so much peak on this website
glosses: Something of exceptional quality.
Derived terms: afterpeak
Beauty Peak
Blackwell in the Peak
Blanca Peak
Borah Peak
Bragg peak
Cloud Peak
Collegiate Peaks
crosspeak
Darke Peak
Electric Peak
forepeak
Gannett Peak
ghost peak
Grays Peak
green-peak
Hayden Peak
Highland Peak
High Peak
hoddy-peak
hoddy peak
interpeak
Luton peak
Maroon Peak
multipeak
nonpeak
off-peak
peak-bagging
peak bagging
peak body
Peak Dale
peak detector
Peak District
peaker
peaker plant
peak flow
peak flow meter
Peak Forest
peak hour
peakish
peakism
peakist
peakless
peaklet
peaklike
peaknik
peak of eternal light
peak organisation
peak season
peak shaving
peak torque
peak vehicle requirement
peakward
peakwise
photopeak
Pikes Peak
Purmerul Peak
semipeak
Spanish Peaks
stiff peak
subpeak
Telescope Peak
Twin Peaks
widow's peak