AI tools

catastrophe

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary

See also: catastrophé and catastrophë

English

English Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia

Alternative forms

Etymology

From Ancient Greek καταστροφή (katastrophḗ), from καταστρέφω (katastréphō, “I overturn”), from κατά (katá, “down, against”) + στρέφω (stréphō, “I turn”).

Pronunciation

Noun

catastrophe (countable and uncountable, plural catastrophes)

  1. Any large and disastrous event of great significance.
    The Chernobyl disaster was a catastrophe.
    • 1896, Henry W[illiam] Lucy, “[Session 1894.] A Bad Beginning.”, in A Diary of the Home Rule Parliament, 1892-1895, London, Paris, Melbourne, Vic.: Cassell and Company, Limited, page 320:
      Last night, after the brief sitting of the House of Lords, and before catastrophe befell the Government in the Commons, I had a long chat with the Premier, in which he discussed the Home Rule question and his relations with it in perfectly frank manner.
    • 1913, H. G. Wells, “The New Source of Energy”, in The World Set Free‎, New York: E. P. Dutton & Company, pages 54–55:
      Between these high lights accumulated disaster, social catastrophe.
    • 1964, Nikos Kazantzakis, Michael Cacoyannis, Zorba the Greek, spoken by Alexis Zorba (Anthony Quinn):
      Am I not a man? And is a man not stupid? I'm a man, so I married. Wife, children, house, everything. The full catastrophe.
    • 2019 May 28, Raymond Zhong, Carolyn Zhang, “Food Delivery Apps Are Drowning China in Plastic”, in The New York Times‎, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on May 28, 2019, Technology‎:
      For years, Mao Da, an environmental researcher, has studied the plastic industry in Wen’an County, near Beijing. Workers there used to sort through food and medical waste by hand, he said. Nonrecyclable material was buried in pits near farmland.
      “It was an environmental and public health catastrophe,” Mr. Mao said.
  2. (insurance) A disaster beyond expectations.
  3. (narratology) The dramatic event that initiates the resolution of the plot; the dénouement.
  4. (mathematics) A type of bifurcation, where a system shifts between two stable states.

Derived terms

Translations

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
Translations to be checked

Dutch

Noun

catastrophe f (plural catastrophes)

  1. (archaic) Superseded spelling of catastrofe.

French

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin catastropha, itself a borrowing from Ancient Greek καταστροφή (katastrophḗ).

Pronunciation

Noun

catastrophe f (plural catastrophes)

  1. catastrophe
    Synonym: désastre

Synonyms

Derived terms

Verb

catastrophe

  1. inflection of catastropher:
    1. first/third-person singular present indicative/subjunctive
    2. second-person singular imperative

Further reading

Wikiwand - on

Seamless Wikipedia browsing. On steroids.