This term comes from the Greek word epitome, which literally means cutout. This word is used to refer to the summary of a large work. Therefore, it is a work that briefly synthesizes or outlines another much broader one. In Spanish, synonymous terms abound, such as sinopsis, compendium, extract, synthesis or summary. Whoever writes this type of creations is an epitomizer.
The fundamental idea of the concept is to describe the most important and significant of a particularly large creation, be it a literary work, an essay, a speech or a body of knowledge. Many works of the classical world are known thanks to their corresponding compendia.
An illustrative example of this modality of synopsis is the “Epitome of the Philippic stories of Pompeyo Trogo” by Marco Juniano Justino. The original work written by Pompeyo Trogo has not been preserved, but its content is known thanks to the corresponding summary.
The same has happened with other great works that, having disappeared, have been known from the synopses that have been made about them, such as “On the construction of spheres” by Archimedes, the poem “Margites” by Homer or the lost books of the Bible. In this sense, it is worth remembering that the Library of Alexandria, which was destroyed after the sack of the city in the 3rd century AD, did not completely disappear, since its manuscripts had been copied and abridged and finally ended up in other cultural centers.
A rhetorical figure that works as a recapitulation
A rhetorical or linguistic figure is a resource used in literary language to embellish a text and convey greater expressiveness. One of these figures is the epitome and consists of repeating some words that have already been used before.
The purpose of this resource is to achieve greater clarity in the message. It is a literary figure integrated into the figures of repetition, such as anaphora, concatenation, pun or alliteration.
Its use in a figurative sense
In the sentences “Eva, the epitome of elegance” or “the team’s new striker is the epitome of the 21st century footballer” this word indicates that someone concretely embodies an idea or concept. It is about identifying a person with something in order to extol his qualities.
It could be said that the individual referred to becomes the synthesis of an ideal.