MASSACRE • E-FREE TRANSLATION.COM • Definition of Massacre

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/mˈæsəkər/ Listen

noun

Massacre n.

The killing of a considerable number of human beings under circumstances of atrocity or cruelty, or contrary to the usages of civilized people; as, the massacre on St. Bartholomew's Day; the St. Valentine's Day massacre; the Amritsar massacre; the Wounded Knee massacre.

Murder. (Obs.)

Synonyms: Massacre, Butchery, Carnage. Massacre denotes the promiscuous slaughter of many who can not make resistance, or much resistance. Butchery refers to cold-blooded cruelty in the killing of men as if they were brute beasts. Carnage points to slaughter as producing the heaped-up bodies of the slain. "I'll find a day to massacre them all, And raze their faction and their family." "If thou delight to view thy heinous deeds, Brhold this pattern of thy butcheries." "Such a scent I draw Of carnage, prey innumerable!"

verb

Massacre v. t. (past & past part. massacred; pres. part. massacring) To kill in considerable numbers where much resistance can not be made; to kill with indiscriminate violence, without necessity, and contrary to the usages of nations; to butcher; to slaughter; limited to the killing of human beings. "If James should be pleased to massacre them all, as Maximian had massacred the Theban legion."

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Etymology of 'Massacre'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Massacre" Quotes from Famous Books

... convinced the people that treachery was intended. It was whispered in the Market-Place that the waggons which rumbled over the drawbridges carried ropes with which the Clauwerts who had remained in the town were to be hanged; that there was to be a general massacre, in which not even the women and children would be spared; and that the Frenchmen never unbuckled their swords or took off their armour, but were ready to begin the slaughter at any moment. It was a day of terror in Bruges, ...

— Bruges and West Flanders • George W. T. Omond

... into the utmost consternation by the death of Henry IV. They apprehended the immediate repeal of the edict, and a renewal of the massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day. But the regent, Mary de Medici, and the court immediately issued a decree confirming the ordinance. Louis XIII. was then a child but eight and a half years of age. As ...

— Louis XIV., Makers of History Series • John S. C. Abbott

... multitudo, he says in his Commentaries. The invaders, on the other hand, found themselves in presence of an intelligent, laborious, assimilable race, trained by the Romans to usefulness. The first of these facts precludes the hypothesis of a general massacre; and the second the hypothesis of a total expulsion, or of such extinction as threatens the inassimilable ...

— A Literary History of the English People - From the Origins to the Renaissance • Jean Jules Jusserand

... having passed without news of the party, the camp seethed with wild report as to its fortune. Some maintained that the Swazis, who were believed to be averse to the opening up of their country, had wiped out the intruders. More or less circumstantial details of the supposed massacre were current, but critical examination proved such to be quite without foundation. Then came wafts of rumor to the effect that the prospectors had "struck it rich," but were determined to keep the strike to themselves. My ...

— Reminiscences of a South African Pioneer • W. C. Scully

... retarded their flight, and many of the leaders were captured. The remnant fled to London, thinking that "every bush was full of marshals," and suffering severely from the hostility of the peasantry. Only three persons were slain in the battle, but there was a cruel massacre of the defenceless citizens after its close. So vast was the booty won by the victors that in scorn they called the fight the Fair ...

— The History of England - From the Accession of Henry III. to the Death of Edward III. (1216-1377) • T.F. Tout

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