Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. A clandestine subversive organization working within a country to further an invading enemy's military and political aims.
Wiktionary
- n. dated A group of people which clandestinely undermines a larger group, such as a nation, to which it is expected to be loyal.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. a group of persons inside the battle lines of a territory engaged in a conflict, who secretly sympathize with the enemy, and who engage in espionage or sabotage; -- sometimes also referred to as a
trojan horse . - n. Hence, any faction of persons within a group who secretly sympathize with an enemy, especially those who engage in activities harmful to the group; an enemy in one's midst; a group of traitors.
WordNet 3.0
- n. a subversive group that supports the enemy and engages in espionage or sabotage; an enemy in your midst
Etymologies
- From a 1936 radio address by Spanish Nationalist general Emilio Mola, in which he spoke of four of his army columns moving on Madrid and a quinta columna consisting of his militant supporters within the capital, intent on undermining the Republican government from within. (Wiktionary)
- First applied in 1936 to rebel sympathizers inside Madrid when four columns of rebel troops were attacking that city. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
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Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘fifth column’.
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There's a word for it
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Specificity
Words that have with subtly different meanings from other words.
vestibule, commoditize, commodify, monetize, corroborate, mezzanine, apposite, irony, calefacient, maxim, pandiculate, rarefaction and 39 more...
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Idioms and Phrases
hack someone off, scrape the bottom..., haul over the coals, rake over the coals, have a thin time, down one's alley, up one's alley, shoot the bull, bite the bullet, up the creek, cudgel one' brains, plain as a pikestaff and 156 more...
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Learned
ambergris, andiron, aphelion, austral, bellicose, boreal, bravura, chaff, chicanery, creditable, credulous, decamp and 223 more...
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play words
words for a play
pert, vicissitude, melancholy, vexation, gaud, attestation, renunciation, wax, wrought, sunder, antipodes, reckoning and 236 more...
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Politrix
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
vexillology, blowback, impunity, extraterritoriality, plenipotentiary, filibuster, pundit, jingoistic, gerrymander, swiftboat, espionage, ipsedixitism and 151 more...
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Extraordinary Ordinals
beethoven's ninth, third world, fourth estate, fifth column, second coming, seventh heaven, third degree, second best, first kiss, sixth sense, celestino the fifth, third rock from t... and 12 more...
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F
fardel, fastidious, febrifuge, febrile, fecund, felicitous, fifth column, fistula, fulguration, fustian, fractious, fainéant and 18 more...
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