debacle

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   An event or enterprise that ends suddenly and disastrously, often with humiliating consequences.

   The event proved to be a great debacle for the partisans of this prognosticator.

From French débâcle, from débâcler (“to unbar; unleash”) from prefix dé- (“un-”) + bâcler (“to dash, bind, bar, block”) [perhaps from unattested Middle French and Old French *bâcler, *bacler (“to hold in place, prop a door or window open”)], from Vulgar Latin *bacculare, from Latin baculum (“rod, staff used for support”), from Proto-Indo-European *bak-. Also attested in Old French desbacler (“to clear a harbour by getting ships unloaded to make room for incoming ships with lading”) and in Occitan baclar (“to close”). The hypothesised derivation from Middle Dutch *bakkelen (“to freeze artificia...

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