''inferno'' ▫ᴱᴺ Entries

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''inferno'' ▫ᴱᴺ｜Definition｜1st｜20260125162428-00-⌔

inferno - Wiktionary, the free dictionary

English

Noun

inferno (plural infernos)

• A place or situation resembling Hell.
  • ✤ At each sudden explosion in the inferno below they sprang back from the brink [of the volcanic crater].¹
  • ✤ When Jurgis had first inspected the packing plants with Szedvilas, he […] found that each one of these lesser industries was a separate little inferno, in its way as horrible as the killing beds, the source and fountain of them all[, and t]he workers in each of them had their own peculiar diseases.²
• A large fire; a conflagration.
  • ✤ The inferno ripped through the forest, destroying anything in its path.
  • ✤ Blast after blast, fiery outbreak after fiery outbreak, like a flaming barrage from within, […] most of Edison’s grounds soon became an inferno. As though on an incendiary rampage, the fires systematically devoured the contents of Edison’s headquarters and facilities.³
  • ✤ Unfortunately for Admiral Kurita, this is where the good news ends. The fire started by New Jersey ’ s hit amidships has spread, and there is now a towering inferno that occupies the middle third of the Japanese battleship.⁴

Etymology

From Italian inferno (“hell”), from Latin infernus (“of the lower regions”), inferna (“the lower regions”); see infernal.

The meaning “big fire” came as a figurative use from the traditional idea of hellfire.

Pronunciation

• (General American) IPA: /ɪnˈfɝnoʊ/
• Audio (Southern England): 🔊
• Audio (US): 🔊
• Rhymes: -ɜː(ɹ)nəʊ

Printed 2026-06-28.

(echo:: @ ⌗)

Footnotes

1. 1899, D. C. Worcester, The Philippine Islands and Their People: ↩

2. 1906, Upton Sinclair, The Jungle: ↩

3. 2006, Edwin Black, chapter 1, in Internal Combustion ‎${}^{[1]}$: ↩

4. 2021 May 5, Drachinifel, 34:59 from the start, in Battle of Samar - What if TF34 was there? ‎${}^{[2]}$, archived from the original on 8 August 2022: ↩

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