You searched for: “tragedy”
disaster, holocaust, tragedy
disaster (di ZAS tuhr, di SAS tuhr) (noun)
A sudden event causing great damage or loss: The rise in the river caused a disaster in the farmland.
holocaust (HAHL uh kost", HOH luh kost) (noun)
Destruction or sacrifice by fire; when capitalized, refers to the destruction of the European Jewish community in the mid-twentieth century: The eruption of the volcano caused a holocaust of the villages below its slopes.
tragedy (TRAJ i dee) (noun)
A very bad event that causes great sadness and often involves someone's death: The flight that crashed into the ocean was a terrible tragedy for many people including the people on the aircraft and their family members.

The high floods along the river caused a disaster to the farms. It was truly a tragedy that so many farmers lost their livestock; however, the oldest farmer was philosophical, reminding everyone that at least it was not a holocaust, because no buildings were burned.

This entry is located in the following unit: Confusing Words Clarified: Group D; Homonyms, Homophones, Homographs, Synonyms, Polysemes, etc. + (page 5)
tragedy (s) (noun), tragedies (pl)
1. A drama or literary work in which the main character is brought to ruin or suffers extreme sorrow, especially as a consequence of a tragic flaw, moral weakness, or inability to cope with unfavorable circumstances; the genre made up of such works and the art or theory of writing or producing these works: William Shakespeare is noted for his many dramas called tragedies, like Hamlet, Prince of Denmark.

A tragedy can also be a play, film, television program, or other narrative work that portrays or depicts calamitous events and has an unhappy but meaningful ending.
3. A disastrous event, especially one involving distressing loss or injury to life: It was an expedition that ended in tragedy, with all hands lost at sea.
4. A tragic aspect or element, such as a lamentable, dreadful, or fatal event or affair; a calamity; a disaster: The people of many countries are experiencing the tragedies of war every time the news tells of more deaths.
5. Etymology: from Old French tragedie (14th century); from Latin tragedia, "a tragedy"; from Greek tragodia, "a dramatic poem or play in formal language and having an unhappy resolution"; apparently literally, "goat song", from tragos, "goat" + oide, "song".

Etymology of tragedy. More etymological information about tragedy.

This entry is located in the following units: ode,-ode, -odal, -odeon, -ody (page 2) tragico-, tragi-, trago-, trag- (page 1)
A unit related to: “tragedy”
Tragedy, etymological features
(Greek: tragoidia, a compound of tragos, "goat" and aeidein, "to sing"; goat song)
Speech: Mark Antony
(as seen in The Tragedy of Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare, 1599, we have this famous speech)
Word Entries at Get Words containing the term: “tragedy”
tragedy of the commons
The degradation of commonly owned resources due to the lack of incentive for individual users to conserve them.

Commons were originally shared grazing areas, which were generally overgrazed. The full expression was coined by Garrett Hardin in 1968.

This entry is located in the following unit: Ocean and Deep Sea Terms (page 6)