Words / F / General

fratricidal

adjective/ˌfrætrɪˈsaɪdl/

C2CEFR level
85/100Rarity: very rare
FormalRegister

Involving the killing of one's own kin or comrades, or ruinous internal strife.

The fratricidal civil war set brother against brother across the divided nation.

Similar: internecine, internal, self-destructive

Origin: From Latin fratricida, from frater 'brother' + caedere 'to kill'.

Topic: civil conflict in General English

Rarity runs from 0 (a word everyone knows) to 100 (almost never seen outside specialist or literary writing). Level is the word's real difficulty on the CEFR scale, from A1 to C2.

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More general words: civil conflict