colossal

«colossal» in Mova's school dictionary: extremely large, huge, enormous — its meaning for a pupil, its sense in the lessons and examples.

part of speech

adjective (colossal)

meaning for a pupil

1) Colossal means extremely large, huge, enormous. tree →

2) (informal) Colossal also means very great in amount or degree («a colossal mistake», «a colossal waste»). tree →

sense in the lessons

In stories, colossal giants, waves and buildings show huge size. In history lessons the Colossus of Rhodes was a giant statue, one of the Seven Wonders of the ancient world; «colossal» comes from it. In everyday talk «colossal» exaggerates for effect.

examples

• A colossal wave crashed over the harbour. tree →
• The blue whale is a colossal animal. tree →
• The pyramids are colossal stone buildings. tree →
• We ate a colossal pizza. tree →
• Losing the key was a colossal mistake. tree →
• The storm did colossal damage. tree →
• The giant took colossal steps across the hills. tree →
• This colossal statue was 39 feet high, and was composed of ivory and gold; its majestic beauty formed the chief attraction of the temple. tree →

note

Spelling: col-OSS-al, double s, one l at the end. Strong word: it is bigger than «big» and «large». Similar: enormous, gigantic, huge, massive.

Trees and pragmatics

Every meaning and example of «colossal» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.