Noun

(en noun)

(astronomy) The point in the sky vertically above a given position or observer; the point in the celestial sphere opposite the nadir.

* 1638 Herbert, Sir Thomas Some years travels into divers parts of Asia and Afrique

The 12 day wee had the wind high and large ?o that in two dayes ?aile we made the Sunne our Zenith or verticall point...

* 1671–1693 : Rev. Thomas Jolly, private notebook ; printed in:

* 1895 , Henry Fishwick (editor), The Note Book of the Rev. Thomas Jolly: A.D. 1671–1693. Extracts from the Church Books of Altham and Wymondhouses, 1649–1725. And an Account of the Jolly Family of Standish, Gorton, and Altham , page 44

In this 10th m. appeared that prodigious Comett the tayl whereof was like the blade of a double edged sword, and reached almost from the horizon to the zenith .

(astronomy) The highest point in the sky reached by a celestial body.

* 1719-

...in the middle of the day, when the sun was in the zenith , the violence of the heat was too great to stir out...

* 1920 , , The Understanding Heart , Chapter II:

As far to the west as Monica could see, her world was a sea of fog, , the fog gradually took on a bluish tinge.

Highest point or state; peak.

* Shakespeare

I find my zenith doth depend upon / A most auspicious star.

* Macaulay

It was during those civil troubles this aspiring family reached the zenith .

* {{quote-book

, page=173 , year=1900 , author=William Beckford , title=The History of the Caliph Vathek citation , passage="There for a while I enjoyed myself in the zenith of glory and pleasure."}}

Noun

(en-noun)

The highest limit.

* P. Colquhoun

Good legislation is the art of conducting a nation to the maximum of happiness, and the minimum of misery.

(mathematics) The greatest value of a set or other mathematical structure, especially the global maximum or a local maximum of a function.

(analysis) An upper bound of a set which is also an element of that set.

(statistics) The largest value of a batch or sample or the upper bound of a probability distribution.

(colloquial, snooker) A 147 break; the highest possible break.

(colloquial, darts) A score of with three darts.

(colloquial, cricket) A scoring shot for 6 runs.