hecatomb
/ˈhɛkətoʊm/
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 1.17 in modern English
17
Scrabble Score
8
Letters
3
Syllables
8
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
A great public sacrifice to the gods, originally of a hundred oxen; also, a great number of animals reserved for such a sacrifice.
noun
A great public sacrifice in other religions; also, a great number of animals or people reserved for such a sacrifice.
Example Sentences
- "O be propitious, powerfull God of Arts, / I sheathe my weapons, and doe breake my darts, / Be then appeas'd, I'le offer to thy shrine, / An Heccatombe, of many spotted kine."
- "[B]oth the muſes and the graces are his hard Miſtriſſes, though he daily Invocate them, though he ſacrifize Hecatombs, they ſtil look a ſquint, […]"
- "But haſte, conſult vve quick ſome prophet here / […] that vve may learn / By vvhat crime vve have thus incenſed Apollo, / VVhat broken vovv, vvhat hecatomb unpaid / He charges on us, and if ſoothed vvith ſteam / Of lambs and goats unblemiſh'd, he may yet / Be vvon to ſpare us, and avert the plague."
- "[I]n th' olden time / Some sacrifices ask'd a single victim, / Great expiations had a hecatomb."
- "[I]t is conceivable that if we were ancients some of us might be offering grateful hecatombs by mistake, and proving our honesty in a ruinously expensive manner."
- "For the god they speedily stationed the sacred hecatomb all in good order surrounding the well-built altar."
Etymology
The noun is a learned borrowing from Latin hecatombē (“great sacrifice of a hundred oxen, hecatomb”), from Ancient Greek ἑκατόμβη (hekatómbē, “great sacrifice of a hundred oxen, hecatomb; any animal sacrifice or large sacrifice”, from ἑκᾰτόν (hekătón, “hundred”) + βοῦς (boûs, “cattle, cow, ox”)). The verb is derived from the noun.
Origin
Word Breakdown
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ˈhɛkətoʊm/
- British English: /ˈhɛkətuːm/