butchery

== English == === Pronunciation === IPA(key): /ˈbʊt͡ʃəɹi/ === Etymology 1 === From Middle English bocherie, from Old French. See butcher for more. ==== Noun ==== butchery (countable and uncountable, plural butcheries) The cruel, ruthless killings of humans, as at a slaughterhouse. (rare) An abattoir, a slaughterhouse. 1899 On the third Friday Jimmie was dropped at the door of the school from the doctor's buggy. The other children, notably those who had already passed over the mountain of distress, looked at him with glee, seeing in him another lamb brought to butchery. — Stephen Crane, Making an Orator. 1901 There was good grass on the selection all the year. I’d picked up a small lot—about twenty head—of half-starved steers for next to nothing, and turned them on the run; they came on wonderfully, and my brother-in-law (Mary’s sister’s husband), who was running a butchery at Gulgong, gave me a good price for them. — Henry Lawson, A Double Buggy at Lahey Creek. The butchering of meat. A disastrous effort, an atrocious failure. A meat market. ===== Translations ===== === Etymology 2 === From butch +‎ -ery. ==== Noun ==== butchery (countable and uncountable, plural butcheries) (slang) The stereotypical behaviors and accoutrements of a butch lesbian.