lethal
English
Pronunciation
Etymology 1
From (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Latin lētālis (“mortal, deadly”), improperly written lēthālis, from lētum (“death”), improperly written as lēthum, as associated with Ancient Greek λήθη (lḗthē, “forgetfulness”).
Adjective
lethal (comparative more lethal, superlative most lethal)
- Deadly; mortal; fatal.
- 2013 July 20, “Old soldiers?”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8845:
- Whether modern, industrial man is less or more warlike than his hunter-gatherer ancestors is impossible to determine. The machine gun is so much more lethal than the bow and arrow that comparisons are meaningless.
Related terms
Translations
deadly
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Noun
lethal (plural lethals)
- Any weapon that causes death.
- Antonym: non-lethal
- (genetics) An allele that causes the death of the organism that carries it.
Etymology 2
Abbreviation of “lauric acid ethereal salt”, so called because it occurs in the ethereal salt of lauric acid.
Noun
lethal (uncountable)
- (chemistry) One of the higher alcohols of the paraffine series obtained from spermaceti as a white crystalline solid.
Translations
alcohol
External links
- “lethal”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
- “lethal”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.