Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. A participant in the Bacchanalia.
- n. The Bacchanalia. Often used in the plural.
- n. A drunken or riotous celebration.
- n. A reveler.
- adj. Of, relating to, or typical of the worship of Bacchus.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Characterized by intemperate drinking; riotous; noisy: as, “bacchanal feasts,”
- Relating to or resembling a bacchanal or the bacchanalia.
- n. One who celebrated the bacchanalia; a votary of Bacchus.
- n. One who indulges in drunken revels; one who is noisy and riotous; a drunkard: as, “each bold bacchanal,”
- n. plural Same as bacchanalia.
- n. Also bacchanalian.
Wiktionary
- adj. Relating to Bacchus or his festival.
- adj. Engaged in drunken revels; drunken and riotous or noisy.
- n. A devotee of Bacchus; one who indulges in drunken revels; one who is noisy and riotous when intoxicated; a carouser.
- n. in the plural The festival of Bacchus; the bacchanalia.
- n. Drunken revelry; an orgy.
- n. A song or a dance in honor of Bacchus.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Relating to Bacchus or his festival.
- adj. Engaged in drunken revels; drunken and riotous or noisy.
- n. A devotee of Bacchus; one who indulges in drunken revels; one who is noisy and riotous when intoxicated; a carouser.
- n. The festival of Bacchus; the bacchanalia.
- n. Drunken revelry; an orgy.
- n. A song or a dance in honor of Bacchus.
WordNet 3.0
- n. someone who engages in drinking bouts
- adj. used of riotously drunken merrymaking
- n. a wild gathering involving excessive drinking and promiscuity
- n. a drunken reveller; a devotee of Bacchus
Etymologies
- From Latin Bacchānālis ("of or pertaining to Bacchus"). See Bacchanalia. (Wiktionary)
- From Latin Bacchānālia, Bacchanalia; see Bacchanalia. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“Lena was explaining the word bacchanal when Violet and Glo arrived at the back door.”
“It's about a king who literally gets eaten alive by all the women in the play in a kind of orgy-it's related to the word 'bacchanal'-and I loved that idea of animalistic chaos and following our own desires. ”
Wired: Gayired.com - Gay OnLine Community for Entertainment and Daily News
“As African-descended (including Indo- and Euro-Caribbean) peoples bring their cultures to urban spaces which are heavily policed, bordered, and confined, some interesting frictions emerge when the people break down fences (which occurred at Caribana) to join floats and dance behind enormous trucks with their booming sound systems, insisting on the politics of "bacchanal" (anything goes) and "chaos theory" while resisting the orderly ways of the state.”
“It's the orgy, the bacchanal, that is to still the lamentations of the poor! ”
An Eagle Flight A Filipino Novel Adapted from Noli Me Tangere
“La Paulée had many satellite events, seminars, tastings and even an auction, but the big event was the Saturday night dinner, a bacchanal the likes of which my liver hopes not to experience again for at least another week or two.”
The Wall Street Journal: Burgundy: When It's Good, It's Very, Very Good...
“His quest for an unparalleled bacchanal takes him to Tokyo and then Berlin, where he helps organize a banquet giant panda paw and white tiger cub are on the menu in what was Hitler's underground bunker.”
The Wall Street Journal: Art's Power to Humiliate and to Heal
“A Hangover-style bacchanal, complete with zoo animals?”
The Huffington Post: Una LaMarche: Project Runway Episode 12 Recap: Empire State of Meh
“Next week, to mark Lundi Gras, on the eve of the city's annual Fat Tuesday bacchanal, the quintet will do a midnight-to-sunrise performance at the famed uptown club Tipitina's.”
“Motel, De Anza coffee shop, Pup and Taco drive-through, my high school just a few blocks off the main drag, Frontier Restaurant, the divey motels that were the sites of many a teen bacchanal.”
A Conversation with Sarah Bird, author of the novel The Flamenco Academy
“A Trinidadian Carnival tradition, J'ouvert incorporates satirical costumes mocking celebrities, politicians and contemporary issues in an ecstatic bacchanal with a different tempo and feel than the better-known daylight parade the following day.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘bacchanal’.
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GRE Barrons Wordlist
A complete Barron's Wordlist for GRE preparation. Your online flashcard replacement.
abase, abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abject, abjure and 4087 more...
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SECOND LETTER A
Words in which the second letter is A
Aa, AAA, Baba, Babe, Babel, AAAA, tangential, baby, bach, back, bad, bade and 90 more...
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phrontistery - b
List of words from phrontistery.info
babeldom, baccate, bacchanal, bacciferous, bacciform, baccivorous, bacillicide, backstay, bactericide, baculiform, baculine, baculum and 582 more...
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Mythical Qualities
Adjectives derived from mythological figures
saturnine, apollonian, dionysian, oedipal, mercurial, martial, erotic, aphrodisiac, orphic, titanic, herculean, puckish and 20 more...
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Snarl words
Please add one purr word (<-- on that list over there, not this one) for every snarl word, so as to maintain equilibrium.
Please put snarl words here, and purr words in the other pl...chainsaw, hack, macheted, kitten, grout, hashtag, gangrene, riptide, bacchanal, ragnarok, deglove, rasp and 9 more...
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wakcy's Words
apocalypse, interlude, drome, absolution, atrocity, ruse, pristine, mason, reparable, deteriorate, pyramid, hipster and 283 more...
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Drunkie
Haay gusy! uiI lieke twebb sit e !!
alcoholize, usquebaugh, whiffled, vinous, enology, aleconner, gambrinous, alcofrolic, perfect barf, bibulous, bleezed, brannigan and 144 more...
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Quaintnesses
For those who wish no words were ever forgotten
opprobrium, tedium, encomium, odium, ire, enmity, beguile, wile, brazen, popinjay, squit, hoity-toity and 1161 more...
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btkuhn's list
persnickety, perspicuity, perspicacity, augur, churlish, enervate, schadenfreude, esoteric, lionize, dispositive, capricious, bibulous and 129 more...
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My GRE words
abase, abate, aberrant, abet, abeyance, abject, abjure, ablution, abnegation, abortive, abrogate, abscission and 140 more...
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ADW1
obdurate, obstinate, behest, injunction, enjoin, circumspect, ensconce, discursive, lugubrious, doleful, somber, ken and 2476 more...
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Namesakes
Words derived from names, be they historical, literary, or mythological.
quixotic, cereal, odyssey, jovial, mercurial, erotic, achilles' heel, confucianism, lovecraftian, narcissism, echo, fallopian and 101 more...
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Reading Reading
Words from the works of Peter Reading - at least one from each (except the Schwitters-esque erosions, cut-ups etc).
overbright, pimpled, muskiness, effuse, stoup, maul, unlevel, viscid, perfidious, glibly, aloes, drouth and 449 more...
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kmalladi's favorites
edification, penchant, ablution, extricate, frank, triumvirate, trifecta, egregious, hoi polloi, articulate, antediluvian, brusque and 291 more...
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Vocab++
Words as I learn them.
fetid, mezzanine, hiatus, austerity, subliminal, resplendent, implacable, impugn, debase, exiguous, cirque, holster and 2538 more...
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Joshee Word List
gash, engross, entail, stoke, ode, vacillate, aspersion, asperity, clan, kith, prospect, nag and 229 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for bacchanal.
yarb Citation on satyr. Jun 22, 2008
little_hobbit_feet This is so descriptive, especially around the holidays. At least where I'm concerned! Dec 28, 2006