CACHINNATION

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does cachinnation mean? 

• CACHINNATION (noun)
  The noun CACHINNATION has 1 sense:

1. loud convulsive laughter

  Familiarity information: CACHINNATION used as a noun is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• CACHINNATION (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Loud convulsive laughter

Classified under:

Nouns denoting communicative processes and contents

Hypernyms ("cachinnation" is a kind of...):

laugh; laughter (the sound of laughing)

Derivation:

cachinnate (laugh loudly and in an unrestrained way)

 Context examples 

I really did not expect any Grace to answer; for the laugh was as tragic, as preternatural a laugh as any I ever heard; and, but that it was high noon, and that no circumstance of ghostliness accompanied the curious cachinnation; but that neither scene nor season favoured fear, I should have been superstitiously afraid.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)