bedlam

/ˈbɛdləm/

bedlam noun: a place or situation of chaotic uproar, and where confusion prevails.

Noun

bedlam (countable and uncountable, plural bedlams)

A place or situation of chaotic uproar, and where confusion prevails.
- Some of the wards were veritable "bedlams," and discharged patients have told of abuses practiced in them of which the mere recital causes a shudder.1888, H.H. Giles, The Insane, and the Wisconsin System for their Care, page 18
- The outside of the Hyatt was bedlam. There was a group of more than a hundred injured people on the circular drive in front of the hotel.2002, Mark L. Friedman, Everyday Crisis Management, page 134
Synonyms:

madhouse, pandemonium
(obsolete) An insane person; a lunatic; a madman.
- Lets follow the old Earle, and get the bedlom
  To lead him where he would, his rogiſh madnes
  Allows it ſelfe to any thing.c. 1603–1606 (date written), [William Shakespeare], […] His True Chronicle Historie of the Life and Death of King Lear and His Three Daughters. […] (First Quarto), London: […] Nathaniel Butter, […]...
- Firſt, The Pilgrims were cloathed with ſuch kind of Raiment, as was diverſe from the Raiment of any that Traded in that fair. The people therefore of the fair made a great gazing upon them: Some ſaid they were Fools, ſome they were Bedlams, and ſome they are Outlandiſh-men.1678, John Bunyan, The Pilgrim’s Progress from This World, to That which is to Come: […], London: […] Nath[aniel] Ponder […], →OCLC, page 123
(obsolete) A lunatic asylum; a madhouse.
- It was a ſhrewd ſaying of the old Monk, That two kind of Priſons would ſerve for all offenders in the World, an Inquiſition and a Bedlam: If any man ſhould deny the Being of a God and the Immortality of the Soul, ſuch a one ſhould be put into the firſt of these, the Inquiſition, as being a...1664, John Tillotson, “Job xxviij. 28.”, in Sermons Preach’d upon Several Occasions, London: […] A[nne] M[axwell] for Sa[muel] Gellibrand, […], published 1671, →OCLC, page 76
- Shut up the world at large, let Bedlam out;
  And you will be perhaps surprised to find
  All things pursue exactly the same route,
  As now with those of soi-disant sound mind.1823 December 17, [Lord Byron], Don Juan. Cantos XII.—XIII.—and XIV., London: […] [C. H. Reynell] for John Hunt, […], →OCLC, canto XIV, stanza LXXXIV, page 157

Proper noun capitalized: Bedlam

Bedlam

A hamlet in Clint cum Hamlets parish, Harrogate borough, North Yorkshire, England (OS grid ref SE2661).
A hamlet in Bitterley parish, south Shropshire, England (OS grid ref SO5877).
A hamlet in Great Elm parish, Mendip district, Somerset, England (OS grid ref ST7549).
(informal) Bethlem Royal Hospital, a famous psychiatric hospital, now located in Bromley, South London.

bedlam meaning in Urdu, Bengali and Malayalam

bedlam in Malayalam

commotion, uproar, pandemonium: കലങ്ങിമറിഞ്ഞ രംഗം, ബഹളസ്ഥലം, കൂട്ടക്കലക്കം, എക്കച്ചക്കം, കൂട്ടബഹളം, പ്രക്ഷ്വേഡനം

Examples of bedlam in a sentence

A car was a rarity, and the sight of one in the distance was sometimes enough to cause bedlam during a class.2005, Kazuo Ishiguro, Never Let Me Go, page 31:
Which actually is a bit like bedlam at times."2020 June 3, Sam Mullins OBE discusses with Stefanie Foster, “LTM: a new chapter begins at 40”, in Rail, page 54:
A blessed thing: only the holy can stand the joys of that bedlam.c. 1909, Mark Twain [pseudonym; Samuel Langhorne Clemens], “Letter II”, in Bernard DeVoto, editor, Letters from the Earth, New York, N.Y....

Synonyms of bedlam

Forms of bedlam

plural	bedlams

Origin of bedlam

From Bedlam, alternative name of the English lunatic asylum, Bethlem Royal Hospital (royal hospital from 1375, mental hospital from 1403) (earlier St Mary of Bethlehem outside Bishopsgate, hospice in existence from 1329, priory established 1247), since used to mean “a place or situation of madness and chaos”. Bedlam as name of hospital attested 1450. Phonologically, corruption of Bethlem, itself a corruption of Bethlehem (the Biblical town), from Ancient Greek Βηθλεέμ (Bēthleém) from Biblical Hebrew בֵּית לֶחֶם (bêṯ leḥem, literally “house of bread”). However, also compare Spanish belén (“confusion, disorder; a place characteristic of such”).

Words formed from bedlam

Phrases with bedlam

Questions about bedlam

What does bedlam mean?: Bedlam means a place or situation of chaotic uproar, and where confusion prevails.
What is bedlam in Urdu?: Bedlam in Urdu is پاگل خانہ. See Bedlam meaning in Urdu.
How do you use bedlam in a sentence?: A car was a rarity, and the sight of one in the distance was sometimes enough to cause bedlam during a class.
What part of speech is bedlam?: Bedlam can be a noun or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce bedlam?: Bedlam is pronounced /ˈbɛdləm/.
What is the plural of bedlam?: The plural of bedlam is bedlams.

Words near bedlam in the dictionary

Adapted from Wiktionary: bedlam (page history and authors); Bedlam (page history and authors); bedlam (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); bedlam (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); bedlam (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-bedlam.wav.

Cite this entry: “bedlam.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/bedlam. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.