different between uproar vs bedlam

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

English

Etymology

From Bedlam, alternative name of the English lunatic asylum, Bethlem Royal Hospital (royal hospital from 1375, mental hospital from 1403) (earlier St Mary of Bethlehem outside Bishopsgate, hospice in existence from 1329, priory established 1247), since used to mean “a place or situation of madness and chaos”. Bedlam as name of hospital attested 1450.

Phonologically, corruption of Bethlem, itself a corruption of Bethlehem (the Biblical town), from Ancient Greek ??????? (B?thleém) from Biblical Hebrew ????? ?????? (bê? le?em, literally “house of bread”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?b?dl?m/

Noun

bedlam (plural bedlams)

1. A place or situation of chaotic uproar, and where confusion prevails.
2. (obsolete) An insane person; a lunatic; a madman.
   • ca. 1605, William Shakespeare, King Lear, Act III, sc. 7:

     Let's follow the old Earl, and get the Bedlam

     To lead him where he would; his roguish madness

     Allows itself to anything.

   • 1678, John Bunyan, The Pilgrim's Progress, Christian overtakes Faithful:

     The pilgrims were clothed with such kind of raiment as was diverse from the raiment of any that traded in that fair. The people, therefore, of the fair, made a great gazing upon them: some said they were fools, some they were bedlams, and some they are outlandish men.

3. (obsolete) A lunatic asylum; a madhouse.
   • 1824, Lord Byron, Don Juan, Canto XIV:lxxxiv:

     Shut up the world at large, let Bedlam out;

     And you will be perhaps surprised to find

     All things pursue exactly the same route,

     As now with those of soi-disant sound mind.

   • 1843, Charles Dickens, "A Christmas Carol":

     “There’s another fellow,” muttered Scrooge; who overheard him: “my clerk, with fifteen shillings a week, and a wife and family, talking about a merry Christmas. I’ll retire to Bedlam.”

   • ca. 1909, Mark Twain, Letters from the Earth, Letter II:

     ... only the holy can stand the joys of that bedlam.

Descendants

• ? Russian: ??????? (bedlám)

Translations

Further reading

• Bethlem Royal Hospital on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• bedlam in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.

Anagrams

• ambled, balmed, beldam, blamed, lambed