bloodbath
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /ˈblʌdˌbɑːθ/
ipa: /ˈblʌdˌbæθ/
Forms: form: bloodbaths
form: blood bath
Etymology: From blood + bath, the latter used referring to a metaphorical deluge. Compare West Frisian bloedbad (“bloodbath”), Dutch bloedbad (“bloodbath”), German Blutbad (“bloodbath”), Danish blodbad (“bloodbath”), Norwegian Bokmål blodbad (“bloodbath”), Swedish blodbad (“bloodbath”), Icelandic blóðbad (“bloodbath”).
Senses: examples: text: There lay the steed; here lay the man; Gude friends that day did twin: They leuch na a' to the feast that cam Whan the het bluid-bath was done.
ref: 1814, Robert Jamieson, “Stark Tiderich and Olger Danske”, in Illustrations of northern antiquities […] , Edinburgh: James Ballantyne and Co., translation of Kæmpe Viser, Popular Heroic and Romantic Ballads, translated from the Northern Languages, with Notes and Illustrations, page 272:
text: He made a "Stockholm BLUTBAD" still famed in History (kind of open, ordered or permitted, Massacre of eighty or a hundred of his chief enemies there), "Bloodbath," so they name it; in Stockholm, where indeed he was lawful King, and not without unlawful enemies, had a bloodbath been the way to deal with them.
ref: 1862, Thomas Carlyle, chapter IX, in History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Called Frederick the Great, volume III, London: Chapman and Hall, […], →OCLC:
text: In movie terms, it suggests Paul Verhoeven in Robocop/Starship Troopers mode, an R-rated bloodbath where the grim spectacle of children murdering each other on television is bread-and-circuses for the age of reality TV, enforced by a totalitarian regime to keep the masses at bay.
ref: 2012 March 22, Scott Tobias, “The Hunger Games”, in AV Club:
glosses: Indiscriminate killing or slaughter; a massacre.
examples: text: Although the Hampden Park blood bath of '94 caused Yale and Harvard to break off football relations for the next two years, they kept close watch on each other.
ref: 1951, Tim Cohane, “Be Each, Pray God, a Gentlemen!”, in The Yale Football Story, New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, page 93:
topics: hobbies
lifestyle
sports
glosses: An aggressive or very violent contest or confrontation.
examples: text: Robert Halfon, a senior Tory backbencher, warned that a general election now would be a “bloodbath” for his party.
ref: 2022 October 16, Pippa Crerar, “Liz Truss fights for survival as even allies say she could have only days left”, in The Guardian:
glosses: An upset (as of a game with unexpected results, or a national presidential convention) or heavy defeat.
examples: text: In an interview after the victory, Daley sought to assure Blacks that there would be no personnel bloodbath at City Hall.
ref: 1989, “Richard Daley Wins Chicago Mayoral Race; Blacks Fail to Unite Behind Tim Evans”, in Robert E. Johnson, editor, Jet Magazine, volume 76, Chicago: Johnson Publishing Company, National Report, page 9:
text: The point is, Amodei is a salesman, and it’s in his interest to make his product appear inevitable and so powerful it’s scary. Axios framed Amodei’s economic prediction as a “white-collar bloodbath.”
ref: 2025 May 30, Allison Morrow, “The ‘white-collar bloodbath’ is all part of the AI hype machine”, in CNN:
topics: business
glosses: A large financial loss or massive layoff brought about by negative economic conditions.
examples: text: On Blood-Baths: An Historical Notice. By Dr. Hecker. According to a dark tradition which is incidentally mentioned by Pliny, the ancient kings of Egypt used to bathe in human blood when they were seized with leprosy.
ref: 1834, “On Blood-Baths: An Historical Notice.”, in The London Medical Gazette; Being a Weekly Journal of Medicine and the Collateral Sciences, volume 13, London: Longman, Rees, Orme, Brown, Green, & Longman, page 813:
glosses: A bath taken in warm blood used as a restorative or medical treatment.