ZENITH • E-FREE TRANSLATION.COM • Definition of Zenith

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/zˈinəθ/ /zˈinɪθ/ Listen

noun

Zenith n.

1.

That point in the visible celestial hemisphere which is vertical to the spectator; the point of the heavens directly overhead; opposed to nadir. "From morn To noon he fell, from noon to dewy eve, A summer's day; and with the setting sun Dropped from the zenith, like a falling star."

2.

Hence, figuratively, the point of culmination; the greatest height; the height of success or prosperity. "I find my zenith doth depend upon A most auspicious star." "This dead of midnight is the noon of thought, And wisdom mounts her zenith with the stars." "It was during those civil troubles... this aspiring family reached the zenith."

Zenith distance. (Astron.) See under Distance.

Zenith sector. (Astron.) See Sector, 3.

Zenith telescope (Geodesy), a telescope specially designed for determining the latitude by means of any two stars which pass the meridian about the same time, and at nearly equal distances from the zenith, but on opposite sides of it. It turns both on a vertical and a horizontal axis, is provided with a graduated vertical semicircle, and a level for setting it to a given zenith distance, and with a micrometer for measuring the difference of the zenith distances of the two stars.

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Etymology of 'Zenith'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Zenith" Quotes from Famous Books

... consisted largely of dictation from the shipping manager, letters relating to outgoing consignments of implements. She was rapid and efficient, and, having reached the zenith of salary paid for such work, she expected to continue in the same routine until she left ...

— North of Fifty-Three • Bertrand W. Sinclair

... mice were difficult to obtain, though their runways branched everywhere deep down under the snow, which to them was a blessing. The nights were cold and still, lit by the great fan of the Aurora Borealis which pulsed upward to the zenith, glowing with its ever-changing colors—delicate green fading into violet and blue, flaming redly or dying away in a pure ...

— Followers of the Trail • Zoe Meyer

... went, single file, through a gorge into which the sun never struck save from the zenith; where the ferns grew lush and the great leaves of the "cucumber tree" hung motionless, they halted without a word and a comprehending glance shot ...

— The Roof Tree • Charles Neville Buck

... Coffee-house in rather earnest talk, "it is a true sublimity to dwell here. These fringes of lamplight, struggling up through smoke and thousandfold exhalation, some fathoms into the ancient reign of Night, what thinks Booetes of them, as he leads his Hunting-Dogs over the Zenith in their leash of sidereal fire? That stifled hum of Midnight, when Traffic has lain down to rest; and the chariot-wheels of Vanity, still rolling here and there through distant streets, are bearing her to Halls roofed-in, ...

— Sartor Resartus, and On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History • Thomas Carlyle

... boat-songs, which were full of a measured rhythmic movement like oar-strokes and the beat of waves. The pink in the west deepened after the sun went down to a vivid orange red, and flamed higher and higher till the zenith caught the glow; and a little crescent moon, which was climbing up, swung like a tiny silver boat on a crimson tide. It was all like a dream, to which the noiseless speed of ...

— A Little Country Girl • Susan Coolidge

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