See also: Gargantuan

English edit

Alternative forms edit

Etymology edit

From French Gargantua, a giant with a very large appetite in Rabelais's The Inestimable Life of Gargantua. Rabelais derived Gargantua from the Portuguese and Spanish garganta (throat).[1]

Pronunciation edit

  • (General American) IPA(key): /ɡɑɹˈɡæn.t͡ʃu.ən/
  • (file)

Adjective edit

gargantuan (comparative more gargantuan, superlative most gargantuan)

  1. Huge; immense; tremendous.
    Synonyms: colossal, enormous, giant, huge, humongous, immense; see also Thesaurus:large
    • 2018 May 4, Tom English, “Steven Gerrard: A 'seriously clever or recklessly stupid' Rangers appointment”, in BBC Sport[1]:
      Some distant observers of the Scottish football scene reckon that all - all! - Gerrard has to do is beat Celtic to become a legend. Even if that was true - and, demonstrably, it is not - then it would be a gargantuan task all on its own.
    • 2019 September 14, Elizabeth Paton, “A Fashion/Food Blowout in the Shadow of Brexit”, in New York Times[2]:
      Or the twinkling dining rooms: all frilly net curtains, pink walls, kaleidoscope-patterned carpets and tiny tables, crammed with teetering piles of hand-painted ceramic crockery (think plates covered in colorful swirls and cocktail mugs shaped like heaving bosoms or ladies’ faces) that showcase gargantuan portions of Italian fare.
    • 2022 April 7, Oliver Milman, “I test-drove the all-electric Hummer. Can it win over America’s EV skeptics?”, in The Guardian[3], →ISSN:
      Boxy and unrefined, the Hummer embodied an outlandishly masculine aesthetic that seemed to almost revel in its gargantuan fuel consumption.
  2. (obsolete) Of the giant Gargantua or his appetite.

Derived terms edit

Translations edit

References edit

  1. ^ Gourd, Pumpkin. See Budge Ref, p 803A; (from 'Rev 12'--Revue Egyptologique publiee sous la direction de MM Brugsch, F Chabas, and Eug. Revillout (vol I-XIV))

Further reading edit