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death knell. In DICTIOUS you will not only get to know all the dictionary meanings for the word
death knell, but we will also tell you about its etymology, its characteristics and you will know how to say
death knell in singular and plural. Everything you need to know about the word
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English
Pronunciation
Noun
death knell (plural death knells)
- The tolling of a bell announcing death.
1872 September – 1873 July, Thomas Hardy, “‘25’”, in A Pair of Blue Eyes. , volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: Tinsley Brothers, , published 1873, →OCLC:The sound was the stroke of a bell from the tower of East Endelstow Church. […] The death-knell of an inhabitant of the eastern parish was being tolled.
1890, Ambrose Bierce, chapter 1, in An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge:Its recurrence was regular, but as slow as the tolling of a death-knell.
- (by extension) A sign or omen foretelling the death or destruction of something.
1901, Upton Sinclair, chapter 10, in King Midas:The thought was a death-knell to Helen's last hope, and she sank down, quite overcome; […]
2015 February 26, Sophie Gilbert, “Soggy Bottoms and 'Sex Box': The Saucy State of TV's British Imports”, in The Atlantic:The dirty little secret at the heart of Sex Box, in fact, was that it was a well-meaning and thoughtful anthropological experiment dressed up as a tawdry, tabloid-bating death knell for standards of common decency.
2018, Michael Cottakis – LSE, “Colliding worlds: Donald Trump and the European Union”, in LSE's blog:A rupture would represent a death knell for the West and would harm the US worker.
Translations
tolling of a bell announcing death
sign foretelling the death or destruction of something
References