suicide

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   The act of intentionally killing oneself.

   The charity offers support to people who are thinking about suicide.

2. 2
   noun

   A particular case of a person killing themselves.

   Police investigated the death as a possible suicide.

3. 3
   noun

   An action that brings disaster on yourself or your group.

   Raising prices now would be political suicide.

Common collocations

• committed suicide Verb + noun

First attested in Thomas Browne's Religio Medici (1643) in noun sense 1, ostensibly from New Latin suīcīdium, from suī (genitive reflexive pronoun) + -cīdium (“act of killing or murder”), but often believed to have originated in English before entering Latin. Displaced native Middle English seolf-cwale from Old English selfcwalu (literally “self-slaughter”), after which suicide may have been modelled, or calqued (compare manuscript). Noun sense 3 is perhaps by analogy with words like homicide, patricide (see -cide), or, although unlikely, from Medieval Latin suīcīda; see the Etymology section…

Topics

External links

• Cambridge Dictionary
• Wiktionary
• Google Images