pestilence
Fatal spreading sickness
Pestilence is a deadly epidemic disease, especially one that spreads rapidly and kills many people.
The word is literary and old-fashioned, evoking biblical or medieval catastrophe: Pestilence swept through the land.
In the Book of Revelation, Pestilence rides as one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.
The word sometimes extends to anything destructive or corrupting: a pestilence of false information.
Deadly epidemic disease
- epidemicWidespread disease occurrence
- pandemicGlobal disease outbreak
- infectionPathogen invasion causing illness
- sicknessBodily disorder or disease
illness · malady · contagion · affliction · outbreak · pathogen · virus · bacteria
Sending of information
- contagionDisease spread by contact
- outbreakSudden eruption of trouble
- vectorQuantity with direction
- carrierOne that transports
contamination · quarantine · incubation · communicable · infectious · zoonosis · host · propagation
Total fatalities counted
- mortalityState of eventual death
- sufferingSustained experience of distress
- catastropheDevastating, large-scale misfortune
- calamitySevere misfortune or disaster
destruction · devastation · ruin · doom · misery · desolation · woe · torment
Medieval bubonic plague pandemic
- Yersinia pestisBacterium causing plague
- bubonicOf groin-node swellings
- medievalOf the Middle Ages
- quarantineIsolation preventing disease transmission
plague doctor · mass graves · flagellants · Great Plague · septicemia · necrosis · charnel house · lazaretto
Fierce, punishing anger
- divine punishmentJudgment from a deity
- apocalypseTotal civilizational collapse
- locustsSwarming crop-destroying grasshoppers
- boilsHeats to bubbling
judgment · prophecy · tribulation · Book of Revelation · horseman · curse · smiting · exodus
plague
Deadly epidemic disease
- epidemicWidespread disease occurrence
- pandemicGlobal disease outbreak
- infectionPathogen invasion causing illness
sickness · illness · malady · contagion · affliction · outbreak · pathogen · virus · bacteria · microbe
transmission
Sending of information
carrier · contamination · quarantine · incubation · communicable · infectious · zoonosis · host · propagation · dissemination
death toll
Total fatalities counted
- mortalityState of eventual death
- sufferingSustained experience of distress
- catastropheDevastating, large-scale misfortune
calamity · destruction · devastation · ruin · doom · misery · desolation · woe · torment · anguish
Black Death
Medieval bubonic plague pandemic
- Yersinia pestisBacterium causing plague
- bubonicOf groin-node swellings
- medievalOf the Middle Ages
quarantine · plague doctor · mass graves · flagellants · Great Plague · septicemia · necrosis · charnel house · lazaretto
wrath
Fierce, punishing anger
- divine punishmentJudgment from a deity
- apocalypseTotal civilizational collapse
- locustsSwarming crop-destroying grasshoppers
boils · judgment · prophecy · tribulation · Book of Revelation · horseman · curse · smiting · exodus · deliverance
- Biblical Afflictionsleprosy, blindness, boils, plagues, lameness
- illnessdisease, sickness, illness, ailment, disorder
- afflictionsaffliction, ailment, disease, illness, malady
- ailmentsache, aches, ailment, cold, flu
- catastrophesdisasters, disaster, natural disasters, catastrophe, apocalypse
- dangersdanger, peril, hazard, risk, menace
pestilencehealth
Condition of body, mind
wellness · vitality · salubrity · flourishing · wholesomeness
pestilenceprosperity
Good fortune, success
flourishing · abundance · thriving · plenty · fecundity
pestilenceblessing
Prayer seeking divine favor
deliverance · salvation · providence · grace · divine favor