CALAMITY

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does calamity mean? 

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

1. an event resulting in great loss and misfortune

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

 Dictionary entry details 

• CALAMITY (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

An event resulting in great loss and misfortune

Classified under:

Nouns denoting natural events

Synonyms:

calamity; cataclysm; catastrophe; disaster; tragedy

Context example:

the earthquake was a disaster

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

bad luck; misfortune (unnecessary and unforeseen trouble resulting from an unfortunate event)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "calamity"):

act of God; force majeure; inevitable accident; unavoidable casualty; vis major (a natural and unavoidable catastrophe that interrupts the expected course of events)

apocalypse (a cosmic cataclysm in which God destroys the ruling powers of evil)

famine (a severe shortage of food (as through crop failure) resulting in violent hunger and starvation and death)

kiss of death (something that is ruinous)

meltdown (a disaster comparable to a nuclear meltdown)

plague (any large scale calamity (especially when thought to be sent by God))

visitation (any disaster or catastrophe)

tidal wave (an unusual (and often destructive) rise of water along the seashore caused by a storm or a combination of wind and high tide)

tsunami (a cataclysm resulting from a destructive sea wave caused by an earthquake or volcanic eruption)

Derivation:

calamitous ((of events) having extremely unfortunate or dire consequences; bringing ruin)

 Context examples 

Little did I then expect the calamity that was in a few moments to overwhelm me and extinguish in horror and despair all fear of ignominy or death.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

In wandering round the shattered walls and through the devastated interior, I gathered evidence that the calamity was not of late occurrence.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

He did not know why, but he felt oppressed by the vague sense of impending calamity.

(The Call of the Wild, by Jack London)

Reportedly, at least two towns — including Makilala in the province of North Cotabato — declared a state of calamity following Wednesday's quake.

(Aftershocks increase death toll of magnitude 6.3 earthquake in southern Philippines, Wikinews)

“This is a dreadful calamity, Mr. Copperfield,” said he, as I entered.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

White Fang sensed the coming calamity, even before there was tangible evidence of it.

(White Fang, by Jack London)

It seemed a small loss to others, but to Jo it was a dreadful calamity, and she felt that it never could be made up to her.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

Happy people, who enjoy so many living examples of ancient virtue, and have masters ready to instruct them in the wisdom of all former ages! but happiest, beyond all comparison, are those excellent struldbrugs, who, being born exempt from that universal calamity of human nature, have their minds free and disengaged, without the weight and depression of spirits caused by the continual apprehensions of death!

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

He could have wished it otherwise; never in his life had he been conscious of so sharp a wish to see and touch his fellow-creatures; for struggle as he might, there was borne in upon his mind a crushing anticipation of calamity.

(The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

Supposing that this unhappy young man’s story were absolutely true, then what hellish thing, what absolutely unforeseen and extraordinary calamity could have occurred between the time when he parted from his father, and the moment when, drawn back by his screams, he rushed into the glade?

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)