crest

plural crests

1. The summit of a hill or mountain ridge.
2. A tuft, or other natural ornament, growing on an animal's head, for example the comb of a cockerel, the swelling on the head of a snake, the lengthened feathers of the crown or nape of bird, etc.

   Synonyms: comb, cockscomb

3. The plume of feathers, or other decoration, worn on or displayed on a helmet; the distinctive ornament of a helmet.
4. governmentA bearing worn, not upon the shield, but usually on a helmet above it, sometimes (as for clerics) separately above the shield or separately as a mark for plate, in letterheads, and the like.

   I liked the man for his own sake, and even had he promised to turn out a celebrity it would have had no weight with me. I look upon notoriety with the same indifference as on the buttons on a man's shirt-front, or the crest on his note-paper.

   1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter I, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC

5. The upper curve of a horse's neck.
6. The ridge or top of a wave.

   Then, too, the same flutter is observed when it glides over the crest of a wave, but this probably only occurs when the wind lies in a certain direction from the axis of flight.

   1926, Ernest Bade, Science and Invention, volume 17, Experimenter Publishing Company, page 462

7. The helm or head, as typical of a high spirit; pride; courage.
8. The ornamental finishing which surmounts the ridge of a roof, canopy, etc.
9. The top line of a slope or embankment.
10. anatomyA ridge along the surface of a bone.
11. informalA design or logo, especially one of an institution, sports club, association or high-class family.

    1 more example

    Hungry for fame and the approval of rare-animal collector Queen Victoria (Imelda Staunton), Darwin deceives the Captain and his crew into believing they can get enough booty to win the pirate competition by entering Polly in a science fair. So the pirates journey to London in cheerful, blinkered defiance of the Queen, a hotheaded schemer whose royal crest reads simply “I hate pirates.”

    2012 April 26, Tasha Robinson, “Film: Reviews: The Pirates! Band Of Misfits :”, in The Onion AV Club

12. Any of several birds in the family Regulidae, including the goldcrests and firecrests.

present singular third person crests · participle present cresting · participle past crested · past crested

1. intransitiveParticularly with reference to waves, to reach a peak.

   The Skagit and Snohomish Rivers, which run through the region, are predicted to crest at record levels.

   2025 December 12, Sam Sifton, “Why Is It So Hard to Build Big Things?”, in The New York Times

   1 more example

   Freud’s cultural and scientific influence crested some 70 years ago, and much of psychiatry’s history since then has consisted of a renunciation of the man, his concepts, and his therapeutic techniques so comprehensive as to have an edge of savagery, even vengeance, to it.

   2026 August 4, Scott Stossel, “What if Freud Was Right?”, in The Atlantic

2. transitiveTo reach the crest of (e.g. a hill or mountain).

   the land rolls gently, so that, upon cresting a low rise or passing a copse of wind turbines, you suddenly spot a lot full of lorries or a complex of gigantic sheds.

   2019 November 21, Samanth Subramanian, “How our home delivery habit reshaped the world”, in The Guardian

3. transitiveTo furnish with, or surmount as, a crest; to serve as a crest for.

   groves of clouds that crest the mountain's brow

   1815, William Wordsworth, Extracts from An Evening Walk

   1 more example

   His legs bestrid the ocean, his reared arm / Crested the world.

   c. 1606–1607 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Anthonie and Cleopatra”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene ii]

4. transitiveTo mark with lines or streaks like waving plumes.

   Like as the shining skie in summers night, / What time the dayes with scorching heat abound, / Is creasted all with lines of firie light

   1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book IV, Canto I”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza 13

1. abbreviationacronymgovernmentAcronym of comparisons, reasons, examples, statistics, testimony, the five types of verbal support used to enhance an oral presentation.

1. A census-designated place in San Diego County, California, United States.
2. A surname.