lynch

Meanings

1. 1
   verb

   to kill someone without legal authority or a trial, especially by a mob and often by hanging

   The mob threatened to lynch the prisoner before he could stand trial.

Appears in

Simplified etymology

Lynch is connected with the early-19th-century expression lynch law, named for Captain William Lynch, who established his own court during the American War of Independence to prosecute supporters of the British.

From the late-18th-century American expression Lynch's law, meaning punishment without a legal trial. The name is commonly associated with Virginia justice Charles Lynch, who imposed extralegal penalties during the American Revolution, although the exact namesake has been disputed.

Topics

External links

• Google Images
• Cambridge Dictionary
• Wiktionary