Word.ws English Dictionary

bread and circuses

Syllables: bread and cir·cus·es/ˈbɹɛd ənd ˈsəː.kəs.əz/US/ˈbɹɛd ənd ˈsɚ.kə.səz/

bread and circuses noun: food and entertainment provided by the state, particularly if intended to placate the people.

Noun

bread and circuses pl (plural only)

  1. (idiomatic, plural, plural-only) Food and entertainment provided by the state, particularly if intended to placate the people.
    • The government of William Ewart Gladstone may not supply the people, as the Roman emperors did, with "bread and circuses," but if giving them plenty to talk about can satisfy a nation, we Britishers ought just now to be very happy. A whole week is never permitted to elapse without some piece of...[1873 January 11, “English Gossip”, in Harper’s Bazar. A Repository of Fashion, Pleasure, and Instruction, volume VI, number 2, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 30, column 4
    • Take a Mahommedan at his devotions, and he is a model of religious abstraction; [...] but see him in his hours of relaxation, or on the occasion of a public holiday, and he is as garrulous and full of laughter as a big child. Like a child, too, he loves noise and movement for the mere sake of noise...1877, Amelia B[lanford] Edwards, “Cairo and the Mecca Pilgrimage”, in A Thousand Miles up the Nile, London: Longmans, Green, & Co., →OCLC, page 35
    Synonyms:
    bread and games
  2. (broadly, plural, plural-only) Grand spectacles staged or statements made to distract and pacify people.
    • One thing which this study makes evident is that the Welfare State fantasy is usually conjured up by some scheming politician posing as a public benefactor and using "bread and circuses", paid for by the people's own money, to buy the support of the populace.1950, Willford I[sbel] King, “The Something-for-nothing Deception”, in The Right Way to Provide Security against Illness and Old Age, [New York, N.Y.]: Committee for Constitutional Government, →OCLC...
    • But is populism actually popular? Or is it simply sedative patronisation, bread and circuses devised by a cynical caste of free marketeers who presumptuously underestimate the collective intellect?2009 April 30, Jonathan Meades, “Yesterday’s Tomorrow: Militant Modernism, Owen Hatherley, Zero Books, 146pp, £9.99 [book review]”, in New Statesman, London: New Statesman Ltd., →ISSN, →OCLC...

Examples of bread and circuses in a sentence

  • Now swings and fireworks are Arabic for bread and circuses, and our pleb's passion for them is insatiable.1877, Amelia B[lanford] Edwards, “Cairo and the Mecca Pilgrimage”, in A Thousand Miles up the Nile, London: Longmans, Green, & Co., →OCLC...
  • It’s tempting to mention bread and circuses here, except there’s no bread.2026 June 15, Michelle Goldberg, “The UFC 250 Was a Garish Spectacle of American Decline”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:

Synonyms of bread and circuses

Origin of bread and circuses

Calque of Latin panem et circenses, a reference to Satire 10 of the Roman poet Juvenal’s Satires (early 2nd century C.E.). The relevant passage states: “… nam qui dabat olim imperium, fasces, legiones, omnia, nunc se continet atque duas tantum res anxius optat, panem et circenses” (“[F]or that sovereign people that once gave away military command, consulships, legions, and every thing, now bridles its desires, and limits its anxious longings to two things only,—bread, and the games of the circus!”). Juvenal was commenting that the Roman people no longer cared for political involvement, and were satisfied with cheap food and entertainment provided by politicians.

Questions about bread and circuses

What does bread and circuses mean?
Bread and circuses means food and entertainment provided by the state, particularly if intended to placate the people.
How do you use bread and circuses in a sentence?
Now swings and fireworks are Arabic for bread and circuses, and our pleb's passion for them is insatiable.
What part of speech is bread and circuses?
Bread and circuses is a noun.
How do you pronounce bread and circuses?
Bread and circuses is pronounced /ˈbɹɛd ənd ˈsəː.kəs.əz/ (UK).

Words near bread and circuses in the dictionary

  1. bread
  2. bread and butter
  3. bread and butter pudding
  4. bread and butter puddings
  5. bread and cheese
  6. bread and circuses
  7. bread and games
  8. bread and honey
  9. bread and milk
  10. bread and roses
  11. bread and salt

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: bread and circuses (page history and authors). 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.

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

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