WORD OF THE DAY: PREEMINENT
What It Means
Preeminent is a formal word used to describe someone or something more important, skillful, or successful than their counterparts or peers. It is used synonymously with outstanding and supreme.
// She’s the preeminent chef in a city renowned for its cuisine.
Preeminent in Context
“In this warmly engaging intellectual biography, [author Paul R.] Viotti traces the life and ideas of Kenneth Waltz, a preeminent figure in post–World War II international relations scholarship.” — G. John Ikenberry, Foreign Affairs, 16 Dec. 2025
Did You Know?
What is noteworthy about the following sentence? “Mount Kilimanjaro is a prominent eminence on the Tanzanian landscape.” You very likely recognised two words that are closely related to preeminent: prominent and eminence. All three words are rooted in the Latin verb stem -minēre, which is taken to mean “to stand out” though there is no record of its use without a prefix. Mount also deserves an honorable mention: it comes from the Latin mont- or mons, meaning “mountain,” which is understood to share a common ancestor with –minēre. Mount leads us in turn to paramount, a word closely related in meaning to preeminent.
