mayhem
Part of speech: noun
Morphological type: simple
Topics: law
Etymology: Inherited from Middle English mayehem, late form of maym, from Anglo-Norman mahaim (“mutilation”), from Old French meshaing (“bodily harm, loss of limb”), from Proto-Germanic *maidijaną (“to cripple, injure”) (compare Middle High German meidem, meiden (“gelding”), Old Norse meiða (“to injure”), Gothic 𐌼𐌰𐌹𐌳𐌾𐌰𐌽 (maidjan, “to alter, falsify”)), from Proto-Indo-European *mey- (“to change”). More at mad. The original meaning referred to the crime of maiming; the other senses derived from this.
Another possible etymology derives the Old French from Provençal maganhar, composed of mal (“evil”) and ganhar (“to obtain, receive”) (compare with Spanish ganar and Italian gavagnare and guadagnare), so literally "to obtain, receive something evil".
The sense "chaos" may have arisen by popular misunderstanding of the common journalese expression "rioting and mayhem".
Inflected forms:
form: mayhems
pos: noun
tags: plural
form: maihem
pos: noun
tags: alternative
obsolete
Senses:
gloss: A state or situation of great confusion, disorder, trouble or destruction; chaos.
pos: noun
tags: uncountable
usually
examples: to cause mayhem
What if the legendary hero Robin Hood had been born into the mayhem of the 20th century?
In all the mayhem, some children were separated from their parents.
In the 1870's, a young newspaper editor named Henry George walked the streets of San Francisco lamenting the paradoxical economic mayhem that lay all around him.
We terrified the mare and foal.
 The fox stood still and far too bold.
 So we strung him up, brush neatly folded -
 Mayhem, maybe.
Yes, I can understand how people were shocked and outraged by the verdict in the Rodney King trial. But, my friends, there is simply no excuse for the mayhem that followed.
Available in an instant, it can be firmly grasped and employed to scrape, gouge, rake, and generally wreak mayhem on any pest who accelerates into assaultive status.
Jack lifted the binoculars to his eyes, and it was difficult not to laugh at the utter mayhem. Faeries ripped plumes from helmets; soldiers found their pistols dangled just out of reach.
Like all Americans, I am outraged by the violence, lawlessness and mayhem.
One TikTok user recorded a Cruise vehicle causing “mayhem” outside of the festival where it was stuck at an angle in the middle of the street.
Andrew and Fiona Eyre, both 52, from Sheffield, had been looking forward to their trip to Paris since booking it in September, but their train was also cancelled. “It was absolute mayhem and the lack of communication was just disgusting,” Andrew said.
Then shouts of “get down” and “shots fired,” as the annual White House Correspondents’ Association dinner descended into mayhem.
gloss: Infliction of violent injury on a person or thing.
pos: noun
tags: uncountable
usually
examples: The fighting dogs created mayhem in the flower beds.
This same man,[…], beat himself weary upon me with a raw hide, I not resisting, and then pantingly threatened me with permanent disfiguring mayhem, if ever again I should introduce his name into print, […]
“Tell me,” I said, “when one surrenders his personal feelings to his professional feelings, may not the action be defined as a sort of spiritual mayhem?”
gloss: The maiming of a person by depriving them of the use of any of their limbs which are necessary for defense or protection.
pos: noun
tags: uncountable
usually
examples: to commit mayhem
There is a story told of a case where a notorious character was charged with the unusual crime of “mayhem”—biting off another man's finger. The defendant's counsel secured adjournment after adjournment—no one knew why.
"Well, it's a funny thing, but I can't get rid of the impression that at some point in my researches into the night life of London yestreen I fell upon some person to whom I had never been introduced and committed mayhem upon his person."
gloss: The crime of damaging things or harming people on purpose.
pos: noun
tags: uncountable
usually
Related words: maim
Derived words: Bayhem
mayhemic
Mayhem Parva
Translations: