plague
Americannoun
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an epidemic disease that causes high mortality; pestilence.
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an infectious, epidemic disease caused by a bacterium, Yersinia pestis, characterized by fever, chills, and prostration, transmitted to humans from rats by means of the bites of fleas.
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any widespread affliction, calamity, or evil, especially one regarded as a direct punishment by God.
a plague of war and desolation.
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any cause of trouble, annoyance, or vexation.
Uninvited guests are a plague.
verb (used with object)
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to trouble, annoy, or torment in any manner.
The question of his future plagues him with doubt.
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to annoy, bother, or pester.
Ants plagued the picnickers.
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to smite with a plague, pestilence, death, etc.; scourge.
those whom the gods had plagued.
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to infect with a plague; cause an epidemic in or among.
diseases that still plague the natives of Ethiopia.
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to afflict with any evil.
He was plagued by allergies all his life.
noun
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any widespread and usually highly contagious disease with a high fatality rate
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an infectious disease of rodents, esp rats, transmitted to man by the bite of the rat flea ( Xenopsylla cheopis )
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See bubonic plague
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something that afflicts or harasses
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informal an annoyance or nuisance
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a pestilence, affliction, or calamity on a large scale, esp when regarded as sent by God
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archaic used to express annoyance, disgust, etc
a plague on you
verb
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to afflict or harass
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to bring down a plague upon
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informal to annoy
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Any of various highly infectious, usually fatal epidemic diseases.
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An often fatal disease caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis, transmitted to humans usually by fleas that have bitten infected rats or other rodents.
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◆ Bubonic plague, the most common type, is characterized by the tender, swollen lymph nodes called buboes, fever, clotting abnormalities of the blood, and tissue necrosis. An epidemic of bubonic plague in fourteenth-century Europe and Asia was known as the Black Death.
Related Words
See bother.
Discover More
The term is also used to refer to widespread outbreaks of many kinds, such as a “plague of locusts.”
Other Word Forms
- antiplague noun
- plaguer noun
- unplagued adjective
Etymology
Origin of plague
First recorded in 1350–1400; Middle English plage, from Latin plāga “stripe, wound,” Late Latin: “pestilence”
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
The president is nonetheless reputed to have brought a degree of stability back to the country scarred by civil war in the 1990s and to a region plagued by conflict.
From Barron's
Last Sunday’s debacle in an uninspiring and ugly loss to a higher-seeded, more aggressive, more talented and more balanced Celtics team seemed to expose all the flaws that plague this struggling and inconsistent Lakers team.
From Los Angeles Times
Bank stocks suffered their worst day since April, plagued by worries about AI and problems in the private-credit market.
One thing software companies can do to help quell some of the concerns plaguing investors’ minds is show that they are making money off their own AI products.
From Barron's
Putting aside the whipsaw effect of recent tariff moves, the biggest problem plaguing the market in recent weeks is artificial intelligence.
From Barron's
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
