penultimate.
Next to last, second to last; immediately preceding the end of a sequence, list, etc.
Meaning & usage
Next to last, second to last; immediately preceding the end of a sequence, list, etc.
Of or pertaining to a penult.
Relating to or denoting an element of a related collection of curves that is arbitrarily close to a degenerate form.
pre-eminent, ultimate, best; par excellence, top-quality
Where this word comes from
Etymology tree Latin paene Proto-Indo-European *h₂el- Proto-Italic *-tm̥mos Proto-Italic *oltm̥mos Latin ultimus Latin paenultimus Proto-Indo-European *-h₂ Proto-Indo-European *-éh₂ Proto-Indo-European *-tós Proto-Indo-European *-eh₂tos Proto-Italic *-ātos Latin -ātuslbor. English -ate English penultimate From Latin paenultimus (“penultimate”) + -ate (adjective-forming suffix), from paene (“almost”) + ultimus (“last”). Equivalent to pene- + ultimate. Compare French pénultième.
A penult, a next to last, particularly
A penult, a next to last The penultimate day of a month.
A penult, a next to last The penultimate syllable of a word or metrical line.
A penult, a next to last The penultimate element of a collection of curves.
A penult, a next to last The penultimate (next to lowest) card in a suit.
Where this word comes from
From a substantivation of the above adjective. Equivalent to Latin paenultimus + -ate (noun-forming suffix).
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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.
Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.