Wiktionary

fatality

English

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Etymology

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From French fatalité. equivalent to fatal +‎ -ity.

Pronunciation

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Noun

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fatality (plural fatalities)

  1. The state proceeding from destiny; invincible necessity, superior to, and independent of, free and rational control. [from 17th c.]
  2. Tendency to death, destruction or danger, as if by decree of fate. [from 17th c.]
  3. That which is decreed by fate or which is fatal; a fatal event. [from 18th c.]
    • 1851, Wilkie Collins, The Twin Sisters:
      What can I say, or think of this most terrible of fatalities?
  4. Death.
  5. An accident that causes death. [from 19th c.]
    • 2011, David Foster Wallace, The Pale King, page 13:
      the whole thing felt like being in a near traffic fatality avoided by inches and later not being able to think of the whole thing lest you begin shaking...
  6. A person killed.
  7. (video games) A move used to deliver a coup de grâce to a defeated opponent.
    • 2023 November 13, James Somers, “A Coder Considers the Waning Days of the Craft”, in The New Yorker‎[1], →ISSN:
      My first enchantment with computers came when I was about six years old, in Montreal in the early nineties, playing Mortal Kombat with my oldest brother. He told me about some “fatalities”—gruesome, witty ways of killing your opponent.

Synonyms

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Coordinate terms

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Derived terms

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Translations

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