| Library / English Dictionary |
BLOODLETTING
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Indiscriminate slaughter
Example:
a huge prison battue was ordered
Synonyms:
battue; bloodbath; bloodletting; bloodshed
Classified under:
Nouns denoting acts or actions
Hypernyms ("bloodletting" is a kind of...):
butchery; carnage; mass murder; massacre; slaughter (the savage and excessive killing of many people)
Sense 2
Meaning:
Formerly used as a treatment to reduce excess blood (one of the four humors of medieval medicine)
Classified under:
Nouns denoting acts or actions
Hypernyms ("bloodletting" is a kind of...):
medical aid; medical care (professional treatment for illness or injury)
Domain category:
medical specialty; medicine (the branches of medical science that deal with nonsurgical techniques)
Dark Ages; Middle Ages (the period of history between classical antiquity and the Italian Renaissance)
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "bloodletting"):
phlebotomy; venesection (surgical incision into a vein; used to treat hemochromatosis)
cupping (a treatment in which evacuated cups are applied to the skin to draw blood through the surface)
