acroteleutic

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noun

The end of a verse or psalm, or something added to it, to be sung by the people by way of a response.

Scrabble 16

Meanings

nounacroteleutic (plural acroteleutics)

plural acroteleutics

  1. obsoleteChristianityThe end of a verse or psalm, or something added to it, to be sung by the people by way of a response.

    And this they would generally keep for an Acroteleutic at the end of their psalms.

    1887, A History of Music: book III. The decline of paganism and the dark ages
    2 more examples

    This mode of conducting the psalmody was sometimes called singing acrostics and acroteleutics, and is the apparent origin of the Gloria Patri repeated at the end of each psalm in our liturgical services.

    1853, John Farrar, An Ecclesiastical Dictionary

    And in this respect the Gloria Patri itself is by some ancient writers called the hypopsalma or epode, and acroteleutic to the psalms, because it was always used at the end of the psalms.

    1855, Richard Bingham, The antiquities of the Christian church, page 18

Origin

  1. Ancient Greekἀκροτελεύτιον“extreme end”
  2. Englishacroteleutic

From Ancient Greek ἀκροτελεύτιον (akroteleútion, “extreme end”).

Full word history & related roots →
Cite this entry
APA

acroteleutic. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/acroteleutic

MLA

“acroteleutic.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/acroteleutic. Accessed November 4, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “acroteleutic,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/acroteleutic.

Source: acroteleutic on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.