different between melee vs uproar

English

Alternative forms

• mêlée
• melée

Etymology

Borrowed from French mêlée, from Old French meslee, feminine past participle of mesler (“to mix”), derived from Latin misce? (“mix”). Doublet of medley.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?m??le?/, /?m?.li/
• (US) IPA^(key): /?me??le?/, /me??le?/, /?m??le?/, /m??le?/
• Rhymes: -?le?, -?li

Noun

melee (countable and uncountable, plural melees)

1. A battle fought at close range; hand-to-hand combat; brawling.
2. A loud, confused or tumultuous fight, argument or scrap.
3. Any confused, disorganised, disordered or chaotic situation.
4. Lively contention or debate, skirmish.
5. (military, historical) A cavalry exercise in which two groups of riders try to cut paper plumes off the helmets of their opponents, the contest continuing until no member of one group retains his plume.
6. Small cut and polished gemstones sold in lots.

Translations

Verb

melee (third-person singular simple present melees, present participle meleeing, simple past and past participle meleed)

1. (video games, slang) To physically hit in close quarters, as opposed to shooting, blowing up, or other ranged means of damage. Often refers to the usage of a hand-to-hand weapon.

English

Etymology

Calque of Dutch oproer or German Aufruhr. Possibly influenced by roar.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /??p???/
• (US) IPA^(key): /??p????/

Noun

uproar (countable and uncountable, plural uproars)

1. Tumultuous, noisy excitement. [from 1520s]
2. Loud confused noise, especially when coming from several sources.
3. A loud protest, controversy, outrage

Synonyms

• See also Thesaurus:commotion

Derived terms

• uproarious
• uproarish

Translations

Verb

uproar (third-person singular simple present uproars, present participle uproaring, simple past and past participle uproared)

1. (transitive) To throw into uproar or confusion.
   • c. 1605, William Shakespeare, Macbeth, Act IV, Scene 3,^[1]

     […] had I power, I should

     Pour the sweet milk of concord into hell,

     Uproar the universal peace, confound

     All unity on earth.

2. (intransitive) To make an uproar.
   • 1661, William Caton, The Abridgment of Eusebius Pamphilius’s Ecclesiastical History, London: Francis Holden, 1698, Part II, p. 110, note,^[2]

     […] through their Tumultuous Uproaring have they caused the peaceable and harmless to suffer […]

   • 1824, Thomas Carlyle (translator), Wilhelm Meister’s Apprenticeship and Travels by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, New York: A.L. Burt, 1839, Book 4, Chapter 8, pp. 210-211,^[3]

     […] the landlady entering at this very time with news that his wife had been delivered of a dead child, he yielded to the most furious ebullitions; while, in accordance with him, all howled and shrieked, and bellowed and uproared, with double vigor.

   • 1828, Robert Montgomery, The Omnipresence of the Deity, London: Samuel Maunder, Part II, p. 56,^[4]

     When red-mouth’d cannons to the clouds uproar,

     And gasping hosts sleep shrouded in their gore,

   • 1829, Mason Locke Weems, The Life of General Francis Marion, Philadelphia: Joseph Allen, Chapter 12, p. 106,^[5]

     Officers, as well as men, now mingle in the uproaring strife, and snatching the weapons of the slain, swell the horrid carnage.

Translations

References