scandal
Forms
- Plural
- scandals
Definitions
1.An incident or event that disgraces or damages the reputation of the persons or organization involved.
- Their affair was reported as a scandal by most tabloids.
- It would not be fair to record the adventures of Father Brown, without admitting that he was once involved in a grave scandal.
- Well, yes, a couple of leaks are all very well, but it takes more than that.. A big scandal perhaps. A political scandal. Or a scandal about something people really understand: Sex.. or money.
2.Damage to one's reputation.
- The incident brought considerable scandal to his family.
3.Widespread moral outrage, indignation, as over an offence to decency.
- When their behaviour was made public it caused a great scandal.
4.A word or deed, lacking in rectitude in some manner, which is an occasion of the spiritual ruin of another.
Frequency
Overall
Uncommon· #3213
By learning goal
- Everyday conversation
- Rare
- General reading & writing
- Uncommon
- Academic
- Rare
- Literature
- Rare
Related words
Etymology
From Middle French scandale (“indignation caused by misconduct or defamatory speech”), from Ecclesiastical Latin scandalum (“that on which one trips, cause of offense”, literally “stumbling block”), from Ancient Greek σκάνδαλον (skándalon, “a trap laid for an enemy, a cause of moral stumbling”), from Proto-Indo-European *skand- (“to jump”). Cognate with Latin scandō (“to climb”). First attested from Old Northern French escandle, but the modern word is a reborrowing. Doublet, via Old French esclandre, of slander.