noun
definition
Any epidemic disease that is highly contagious, infectious, virulent and devastating.
definition
Anything harmful to morals or public order.
Examples of pestilence in a Sentence
The pestilence was fearfully severe.
The nature of this pestilence has been a matter of much controversy, and some have doubted its being truly the plague.
A plague smote the city, and when it was removed to Ekron, pestilence followed in its wake.
Pestilence broke out in his army, which was so wasted as to be incapable of further operations in Italy.
London had been ravaged by plague on many former occasions, but the pestilence that began in December 1664 lives in history as "the Plague of London."
Famine and pestilence at home drove men to emigrate hopefully to the golden East.
At the end of the 16th century there was a pestilence following a prolonged famine, and in the 17th century two violent epidemics are recorded under the names ta'un and waba.
By them the Parthian War was brought to a conclusion in 165, but Verus and his army brought back with them a terrible pestilence, which spread through the whole empire.
Desertion, pestilence and famine added to the usual horrors of a siege, and at length on the ninth day of the fourth month 586, a breach was made in the walls.
The Sidra Rabbet knows of three total destructions of the human race by fire and water, pestilence and sword, a single pair alone surviving in each case.
He died in 1190 at Antioch of pestilence.
All this unrest might well be ascribed to Lancasters want of ability, but he had also to bearwith less justicethe discontent caused by two years of famine and pestilence.
The disastrous invasion of the Turks, incessant civil wars and devastation by foreign armies and pestilence, caused a very heavy loss both of population and of prosperity.
When the Greeks were visited with pestilence on account of Chryseis, he disclosed the reasons of Apollo's anger.
In order to appease the wrath of Apollo, who had visited the camp with a pestilence, Agamemnon had restored Chryseis, his prize of war, to her father, a priest of the god, but as a compensation deprived Achilles, who had openly demanded this restoration, of his favourite slave Briseis.
When Laomedon refused to pay the reward agreed upon, Apollo visited the land with a pestilence, and Poseidon sent up a monster from the sea, which ravaged the land.
The paid teachers - whom modern writers set down as the sophists, and denounce as the modern pestilence of their age - were not distinguished in any marked or generic way from their predecessors."
Benedictus, De observatione in pestilentia, 4to (Venice, 1 493); Nicolaus Massa, De febre pestilentia, 4to (Venice, 1556, &c.); Fioravanti, Regimento della peste, 8vo, Venice, 1556; John Woodall, The Surgeon's Mate, folio (London, 1639); Van Helmont, Tumulus pestis, 8vo (Cologne, 1644, &c.); Muratori, Trattato del governo della peste, Modena, 1714; John Howard, An Account of Lazarettoes in Europe, &c., 4to (London, 1789); Patrick Russell, A Treatise of the Plague, 4to (London, 1791); Thomas Hancock, Researches into the Laws of Pestilence, 8vo (London, 1821); Fodere, Lecons sur les epide'mies, &c., 4 vols.
Having captured Ancona, he marched to Rome, stormed the Leonine city, and procured the enthronement of Paschal, and the coronation of his wife Beatrix; but his victorious career was stopped by the sudden outbreak of a pestilence which destroyed the German army and drove the emperor as a fugitive to Germany, where he remained for the ensuing six years.
Surely he shall deliver thee from the snare of the fowler, and from the noisome pestilence.
Thus we find dictators destined to hold the elections, to make out the list of the senate, to celebrate games, to establish festivals, and to drive the nail into the temple of Jupiter - an act of natural magic which was believed to avert pestilence.
The wars which ensued, the closing of continental ports against English trade, the occupation of the city after the disastrous battle of Jena, and pestilence within its walls brought about a severe commercial crisis and caused a serious decline in its prosperity.
In 1813 it was ravaged by a famine and pestilence, which destroyed a great proportion of its inhabitants, - according to some accounts, nearly one-half.
Such were the copiatae or grave-diggers, the psalmistae or chaunters, and the parabolani, who at great personal risk - whence the name - visited the sick in pestilence.
In 397 Syracuse had to stand a siege from the Carthaginians under Himilco, who took up his quarters at the Olympieum, but his troops in the marshes below suffered from pestilence, and a masterly combined attack by land and sea by Dionysius ended in his utter defeat.
But a pestilence broke out in the autumn of 212, which swept them clean away, and thinned the Roman ranks.
This dread of pestilence, united with a puritanic hatred of plays, made the citizens do all they could to discountenance theatrical entertainments.
Civil war and pestilence were devastat- „azir.
Among the other legends of Babylonia may be mentioned those of Namtar, the plague-demon, of Urra, the pestilence, of Etanna and of Zu.
Neglect of the worship of these heroes was held to be responsible for pestilence, bad crops and other misfortunes, while, on the other hand, if duly honoured, their influence was equally beneficent.
Then the sword bent towards the earth, the sky darkened, thunder pealed, lightning flashed, and the whole world was wasted by famine, bloodshed and pestilence.
A pestilence drove Otto to Germany in 965, and finding the Romans again in arms on his return in 966, he allowed his soldiers to sack the city, and severely punished the leaders of the rebellion.
Desperate, but not very successful, efforts were made to enforce the statute of Labourers, of 1351, by which it was sought to maintain prices and wages as they had been before the pestilence.
Blessed is Pat man fiat haft not gone in fie counsell of wicked men, and in fie weye of sinfull men hap not stonde, and in fie chaire of pestilence sat not.
A pestilence that ensued being attributed to this crime, the Delphians declared their willingness to make compensation, which, in default of a nearer connexion, was claimed and received by Iadmon, the grandson of his old master.
The cathedral dates from the i 8th century; and to the same period belongs another church, rebuilt after a fire, but originally erected as a votive offering after the pestilence of 1348, and dedicated to San Biagio (St Blaize), the patron of Ragusa, whose name and effigy continually appear on coins and buildings.
Between invasion and home discontent, the tyrant was all but lost; but the Spartan Pharacidas stood his friend; the Carthaginians again suffered from pestilence in the marshes of Lysimelia; and after a masterly combined attack by land and sea by Dionysius Himilco went away utterly defeated, taking with him his Carthaginian troops and forsaking his allies.
The period of internal disturbances, which had been accompanied by famine and pestilence, had caused usurpers to spring up in all parts of Egypt, and Badr was compelled practically to reconquer the country.
But the country had been laid very low by war, pestilence and famine, though it recovered itself with wonderful rapidity.
Again, it must have been the pestilence decimating Milan in1484-1485which gave occasion to the projects submitted by Leonardo to Ludovico for breaking up the city and reconstructing it on improved sanitary principles.
Under the Mahommedans a pestilence turned the capital into a silent wilderness, never again to be re-peopled.
A famous instance of these penitential litanies is the litania septiformis ordered by Gregory the Great in the year 590, when Rome had been inundated and pestilence had followed.
A pestilence, however, which attacked his forces compelled him to land in Italy three days later, and on the 29th of the same month he was excommunicated by the new pope, Gregory IX.
Previously Africa smitten by new animal pestilence Jesus H. Christ we're all going to die!
We are told that ' because of our misdeeds, this monster brought a great pestilence ' .
This resulted in a pestilence which not only lessened the population, but threatened to give the death-blow to the great annual fairs; and at the close of the war it was found that it had cost the city no less than 228,93, gulden.
The usurper was, however, able to maintain himself for two years only, famine and pestilence which prevailed in Egypt and Syria during his reign renderiqg him unpopular, while his arbitrary treatment of the amirs also gave offence.
Besides the extortions to which this practice gave occasion the country suffered greatly in these centuries from famine and pestilence.
When the Athenians were visited by a pestilence in consequence of the murder of Cylon, he was invited by Solon (596) to purify the city.
Nearly the whole of Europe was gradually overrun by the pestilence.