Massacre
incident where some group is killed by another
A massacre is an event of killing defenseless human beings or animals. It is generally used to describe a targeted mass killing of civilians by an armed group. It can also be used figuratively to refer to a one-sided exchange between armed groups. The word is a loan of a French term for "butchery" or "carnage". Other terms with overlapping scope include war crime, pogrom, mass killing, mass murder, and extrajudicial killing.
Etymology
Massacre derives from late 16th century Middle French word macacre meaning "slaughterhouse" or "butchery". Further origins are dubious, though the word may be related to Latin macellum "provisions store, butcher shop".
The Middle French word macecr "butchery, carnage" is first recorded in the late 11th century. Its primary use remained the context of animal slaughter (in hunting terminology referring to the head of a stag) well into the 18th century.
The use of macecre "butchery" of the mass killing of people dates to the 12th century, implying people being "slaughtered like animals".
“Massacre” enters the record as incident where some group is killed by another. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Massacre, incident and where can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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“Massacre” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Massacre, incident and where provides the most credible route into that argument.
Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 13, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3199915. The Library of Congress control number is sh85081954. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank.
Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “Massacre” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.