Dictionary Definition
plague
Noun
1 a serious (sometimes fatal) infection of
rodents caused by Yersinia pestis and accidentally transmitted to
humans by the bite of an infected rat flea (especially bubonic
plague)
2 any epidemic disease with a high death rate
[syn: pestilence]
3 a swarm of insects that attack plants; "a
plague of grasshoppers" [syn: infestation]
4 any large scale calamity (especially when
thought to be sent by God)
5 an annoyance; "those children are a damn
plague"
Verb
1 cause to suffer a blight; "Too much rain may
blight the garden with mold" [syn: blight]
2 annoy continually or chronically; "He is known
to harry his staff when he is overworked"; "This man harasses his
female co-workers" [syn: harass, hassle, harry, chivy, chivvy, chevy, chevvy, beset, molest, provoke]
User Contributed Dictionary
English
Etymology
From plage < plaga. Cognate with Dutch plaag, German Plage, Swedish plåga, French plaie and Polish plaga.Pronunciation
- , /pleɪɡ/, /pleIg/
-
- Rhymes with: -eɪɡ
Noun
- A widespread
affliction, calamity, or destructive influx especially when seen as
divine retribution.
- A plague of locusts
- The disease "plague", caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis and mostly known by its variant form bubonic plague.
- An epidemic or pandemic caused by any pestilence, but specifically by the disease "plague".
Translations
specific disease "plague"
- Czech: mor
- French: peste
- Polish: dżuma
- trreq Romanian
- Russian: мор
- Slovene: kuga
Translations to be categorised
- Afrikaans: plaag
- Albanian: murtajë
- Arabic:
- Azeri: qırğın
- Basque: izurri
- Bosnian: kuga
- Bulgarian: тормози (tormozi)
- Catalan: plaga
- Chinese: 鼠疫 (shǔ yì)
- Cornish: malbew
- Croatian: kuga
- Czech: zlořád
- Danish: pest
- Dutch: plaag
- Esperanto: pesto
- Estonian: katk
- Faeroese: plága
- Finnish: vitsaus
- Frisian: pleach
- Galician: praga
- German: Plage
- Greek: πανούκλα (panoúkla)
- Hebrew: מַגֵּפָה (maggefa)
- Hindi: mahamari
- Hungarian: pestis
- Indonesian: pes
- Irish: plá
- Italian: peste
- Japanese: ペスト (pesuto)
- Korean: 전염병 (jeonyeombyeong)
- Kurdish: weba
- Latvian: liksta
- Norwegian: pest
- Persian:
- Portuguese: peste
- Romani: džukhli
- Russian: чума (čumá)
- Scottish Gaelic: plàigh
- Serbian: kuga , čuma
- Slovak: mor
- Spanish: plaga
- Somalian: daacuun
- Swahili: tauni
- Swedish: pest
- Tagalog: pestihin
- Thai: (kal rókh)
- Turkish: veba
- Ukrainian: чума (čumá)
- Vietnamese: bệnh dịch
- Welsh: pla
Verb
- To harass, pester or annoy someone persistently or incessantly.
- Wikis are often plagued by vandalism
- To afflict someone with a disease or calamity.
Extensive Definition
Plague may refer to:
In medicine:
- Plague (disease), a specific disease caused by Yersinia pestis. There are three major manifestations
- Any bubo-causing disease
- A pandemic caused by such a disease
- Any pestilence, a virulent and highly infectious disease
In history:
- Black Death, also known as The Black Plague: the Eurasian pandemic thought to have been caused by bubonic plague, beginning in the 14th century with repeated outbreaks until the 18th century
- Plague of Justinian, a pandemic in 541–542 AD in the Byzantine Empire, considered to have caused or contributed to the Black Death
- Antonine Plague, an ancient pandemic in 165–189 AD brought back to the Roman Empire by troops returning from campaigns in the Near East
- Third Pandemic, a major plague pandemic that began in China in 1855, spread via trade routes around the world. This episode was considered active until 1959, when worldwide casualties dropped to 200 per year.
- List of historical plagues
In art and literature:
- Plagues of Egypt, the 10 calamities that God inflicted on Egypt in the book of Exodus
- The Plague, a novel by Albert Camus
- The Plague (magazine), New York University's comedy magazine
- A Journal of the Plague Year, a novel by Daniel Defoe
- The Plague (Dragon Prince), an epidemic in Melanie Rawn's fantasy novel Dragon Prince
- Plague (2000 novel), a novel by Malcolm Rose
- Plague 99, 1989 novel by Jean Ure
- The Scarlet Plague, 1912 novel by Jack London
In popular culture:
- The Plague (film), a 2006 horror film
- The Plague (Father Ted), an episode of Father Ted
- The Plague (band), a New Zealand band
- The Plague (English punk rock band), an English band
- Plagues (album) by The Devil Wears Prada
- Plague (wrestler), the stage name of a U.S. professional wrestler
- The Plague (comics), a Cobra special forces team made up of a specialist from each viper division in the G.I. Joe: America's Elite comic.
Other:
- Widespread influx of an animal species afflicting the environment and/or agriculture
- Capacitor plague, a condition afflicting computer motherboards in which capacitors fail
- Corrupted Blood, a virtual plague that occurred in the video game World of Warcraft
plague in Welsh: Pla
plague in French: Plague
Synonyms, Antonyms and Related Words
afflict, affliction, aggravate, aggravation, ail, ambulatory plague, anguish, annoy, annoyance, apply pressure,
badger, bait, bane, be at, be the matter,
bedevil, beleaguer, beset, besiege, bevy, bitch, black death, black plague,
blandish, blight, bother, bristle, brown off, bubonic
plague, bug, bugbear, bullyrag, burden, burn up, buttonhole, cajole, calamity, cellulocutaneous
plague, chafe, charm, chevy, chivy, cloud, coax, complicate matters, concern, covey, crawl with, creep with,
crushing burden, curse,
death, defervescing
plague, destruction,
devil, discommode, discompose, disease, distemper, distress, disturb, dog, drag, dun, epidemic, epiphytotic, epizootic, evil, exasperate, exercise, exert pressure,
fash, flight, flock, fret, gaggle, gall, get, glandular plague, gnaw, grievance, gripe, harass, harm, harry, hassle, haunt, headache, heckle, hector, hemorrhagic plague,
hive, hound, importune, inconvenience, infest, infestation, infliction, invade, invasion, irk, irritate, irritation, larval plague,
lousiness, miff, molest, murmuration, murrain, nag, nag at, needle, nemesis, nettle, nudzh, nuisance, open wound, overrun, overrunning, overspread, overspreading, overswarm, overswarming, pandemia, pandemic, peeve, perplex, persecute, perturb, pest, pester, pesthole, pestilence, pick on, pique, plague spot, pluck the
beard, ply, pneumonic
plague, pother,
premonitory plague, press,
pressure, provoke, push, put out, put to it, puzzle, ravage, ride, rile, roil, ruffle, running sore, scourge, septicemic plague,
siderating plague, skein,
spring, swarm, swarm with, swarming, tease, teeming, thorn, torment, torture, trouble, try the patience,
tuberculosis, tweak
the nose, urge, vex, vexation, visitation, watch, wheedle, white plague, woe, work on, worry