encomium

plural encomiums · plural encomia

1. Warm praise, especially a formal expression of such praise; a tribute.

   "I never seen their like," was Lassiter's encomium, "an' in my day I've seen a sight of horses."

   1912 January, Zane Grey, chapter 3, in Riders of the Purple Sage […], New York, N.Y.; London: Harper & Brothers Publishers, →OCLC

   5 more examples

   I rejoined our people, and expected a reprimand for having forced the enemy without orders; though I had my excuse ready. But here I was mistaken; for I met with nothing but encomiums.

   1763, Antoine-Simon Le Page du Pratz, The History of Louisiana: Or of the Western Parts of Virginia and Carolina: Containing a Description of the Countries that Lye on both Sides of the River Missisipi [sic]: With an Account of the Settlements … Translated from the French … by M. Le Page du Pratz; with some Notes and Observations … In two volumes. …, London: Printed for T. Becket and P. A. De Hondt, OCLC 181837275 (English translation of Histoire de la Louisiane : contenant la découverte de ce vaste pays, sa description géographique, un voyage dans les terres, l'histoire naturelle, les mœurs, coûtumes & religion des naturels, avec leurs origines : deux voyages dans le nord du nouveau Mexique, dont un jusqu'à la mer du Sud : ornée de deux cartes & de 40 planches en taille douce, Paris : Chez de Bure, l'aîné …, la veuve Delaguette …, Lambert …, 1758, OCLC 1651361), page 39

   ...and where he never failed to lavish on me every gift his fortune could supply, delight me by the encomiums he bestowed on my music and needlework (always an object of importance in a nunnery), and prove, by his admiring looks and his tender tones, how entirely he loved me.

   1842, [anonymous collaborator of Letitia Elizabeth Landon], chapter LII, in Lady Anne Granard; or, Keeping up Appearances. […], volume III, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC, page 38

   Many a new locomotive class has received encomiums in these columns because its early work was outstanding, judged by the then prevailing standards.

   1944 March and April, Cecil J. Allen, “British Locomotive Practice and Performance”, in Railway Magazine, page 89

   I am, you will agree, mature, and in my earlier days I won no little praise for my skill at hunt-the-slipper. I remember one of the hostesses whose Christmas parties I attended comparing me to a juvenile bloodhound. An extravagant encomium, of course, but that is what she said.

   1960, P. G. Wodehouse, Jeeves in the Offing, chapter X

   This is the last part but one (No. 10, dealing with engines absorbed after 1922, is still to come) of the monumental R.C.T.S. history, which needs no further encomium for students of G.W.R. locomotive practice.

   1962 June, “New Reading on Railways: The Locomotives of the Great Western Railway, Part Nine: Two-Cylinder Classes. The Railway Correspondence & Travel Society, 12s.”, in Modern Railways, page 432

2. rhetoricA general category of oratory.
3. rhetoricA method within rhetorical pedagogy.
4. The eighth exercise in the progymnasmata series.
5. literatureA genre of literature that included five elements: prologue, birth and upbringing, acts of the person's life, comparisons used to praise the subject, and an epilogue.