MISCHANCE

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does mischance mean? 

• MISCHANCE (noun)
  The noun MISCHANCE has 2 senses:

1. an unpredictable outcome that is unfortunate

2. an instance of misfortune

  Familiarity information: MISCHANCE used as a noun is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• MISCHANCE (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

An unpredictable outcome that is unfortunate

Classified under:

Nouns denoting natural phenomena

Synonyms:

bad luck; mischance; mishap

Context example:

if I didn't have bad luck I wouldn't have any luck at all

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

chance; fortune; hazard; luck (an unknown and unpredictable phenomenon that causes an event to result one way rather than another)

Sense 2

Meaning:

An instance of misfortune

Classified under:

Nouns denoting natural events

Synonyms:

misadventure; mischance; mishap

Hypernyms ("mischance" 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 "mischance"):

accident (an unfortunate mishap; especially one causing damage or injury)

near miss (an accidental collision that is narrowly avoided)

derailment (an accident in which a train runs off its track)

ground loop (a sharp uncontrollable turn made by an airplane while moving along the ground)

puncture (loss of air pressure in a tire when a hole is made by some sharp object)

slip; trip (an accidental misstep threatening (or causing) a fall)

crash ((computer science) an event that causes a computer system to become inoperative)

 Context examples 

But the youngest said, I don’t know how it is, while you are so happy I feel very uneasy; I am sure some mischance will befall us.

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

In an instant Alleyne and John were on foot, and had lifted her forth all in a shake with fear, but little the worse for her mischance.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Anne could do no more; but her heart prophesied some mischance to damp the perfection of her felicity.

(Persuasion, by Jane Austen)

One of his most intimate friends was a merchant who, from a flourishing state, fell, through numerous mischances, into poverty.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

I remember that he frightened as well as fascinated me with his talk of battles, and I can recall as if it were yesterday the horror with which I gazed upon a spot of blood upon his shirt ruffle, which had come, as I have no doubt, from a mischance in shaving.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

She felt all the perverseness of the mischance that should bring him where no one else was brought, and, to prevent its ever happening again, took care to inform him at first that it was a favourite haunt of hers.

(Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen)

He was clearly so scared by his mischance in breaking the window and by the approach of Peterson that he thought of nothing but flight, but since then he must have bitterly regretted the impulse which caused him to drop his bird.

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

In the meanwhile, they proceeded on their journey without any mischance, and were within view of the town of Keynsham, when a halloo from Morland, who was behind them, made his friend pull up, to know what was the matter.

(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)

By my troth! said Chandos with a smile, it is very fitting that we should be companions, Nigel, for since you have tied up one of your eyes, and I have had the mischance to lose one of mine, we have but a pair between us.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

I think, answered the bean, that as we have so fortunately escaped death, we should keep together like good companions, and lest a new mischance should overtake us here, we should go away together, and repair to a foreign country.

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)