SLAYING

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does slaying mean? 

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

1. unlawful premeditated killing of a human being by a human being

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

 Dictionary entry details 

• SLAYING (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Unlawful premeditated killing of a human being by a human being

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Synonyms:

execution; murder; slaying

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

homicide (the killing of a human being by another human being)

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

butchery; carnage; mass murder; massacre; slaughter (the savage and excessive killing of many people)

thuggee (murder and robbery by thugs)

tyrannicide (killing a tyrant)

shoot-down (murder by shooting someone down in cold blood)

infanticide (murdering an infant)

hit (a murder carried out by an underworld syndicate)

dry-gulching (the act of killing from ambush)

regicide (the act of killing a king)

lynching (putting a person to death by mob action without due process of law)

assassination (murder of a public figure by surprise attack)

elimination; liquidation (the murder of a competitor)

filicide (the murder of your own son or daughter)

uxoricide (the murder of a wife by her husband)

fratricide (the murder of your sibling)

mariticide (the murder of a husband by his wife)

parricide (the murder of your own father or mother)

contract killing (a murder carried out on agreement with a hired killer)

bloodshed; gore (the shedding of blood resulting in murder)

Derivation:

slay (kill intentionally and with premeditation)

 Context examples 

They are afraid of this Ghost Dog, for it has cunning greater than they, stealing from their camps in fierce winters, robbing their traps, slaying their dogs, and defying their bravest hunters.

(The Call of the Wild, by Jack London)

It was the occasion when he was accused of slaying his younger brother and fled from the country.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Touching that same slaying of the Redeemer, it was a bad business.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Three times we have had to draw, and once at La Reolle we stood over our wool-bales, Watkin and I, and we laid about us for as long as a man might chant a litany, slaying one rogue and wounding two others.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)