climax

Where it comes from

Climax came through Late Latin from Greek klimax, a ladder. In rhetoric, the word named an arrangement that advanced through successively stronger words, clauses, or propositions, as though climbing rung by rung.

How the meaning developed

English first used climax for that rising rhetorical sequence. By the late eighteenth century, attention shifted from the whole ascent to its highest point, producing the familiar culmination of a story or event; later specialized senses followed from peak intensity.