Word.ws English Dictionary

fratricides

fratricides is the plural of fratricide.

Meaning of fratricide

Noun (1)

fratricide (countable and uncountable, plural fratricides)

  1. The killing of one's brother (or sister).
    • The new accusation brought by Urban against Manfred of murdering his sister-in-law's embassador – it may be observed that, tacitly, he acquits him of parricide, fratricide, and nepoticide – requires a little explanation.1856, Mrs. William Busk, Mediæval Popes, Emperors, Kings, and Crusaders: Or, Germany, Italy and Palestine, from A.D. 1125 to A.D. 1268, volume IV, London: Hookham and Sons, →OCLC, page 294
  2. (broadly) The intentional or unintentional killing of a comrade in arms.
    • From January on, Third Army also spent a good deal of energy trying to solve the problem of fratricide, the killing or injuring of one's own forces by what is ironically called 'friendly fire,'[…]1999, Richard M. Swain, Lucky War: Third Army in Desert Storm, DIANE Publishing, page 180
  3. (broadly) The undesirable situation where the separate missiles from a MIRV interfere with each other as they explode.

Noun (2)

fratricide (plural fratricides)

  1. A person who commits fratricide.
    • Can Signorio was twice a fratricide, the last time when he lay upon his death-bed: his tomb bears upon its gables the images of six virtues, — Faith, Hope, Charity, Prudence, and (I believe) Justice and Fortitude.1853, John Ruskin, “Roman Renaissance”, in The Stones of Venice, volume III (The Fall), London: Smith, Elder, and Co., […], →OCLC, § LVI, page 73
    Synonyms:
    brother-slayer

Questions about fratricides

What is fratricides the plural of?
Fratricides is the plural of fratricide.

Words near fratricides in the dictionary

  1. fratriarchal
  2. fratriarchy
  3. fratricidal
  4. fratricidally
  5. fratricide
  6. fratricides
  7. fratries
  8. fratry
  9. frats
  10. Fratte
  11. fratted

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: fratricides (page history and authors); fratricide (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)-Wodencafe-fratricides.wav.

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