matricide
Matricide (noun) means the act of killing one's own mother. Example: “The play's plot turns on an act of matricide.”
How to use matricide
Learner’s notesIn plain EnglishKilling your own mother, or someone who has done so.
It is a formal, mostly written word, typical of legal, literary or academic contexts.
The -cide ending appears in a family of similar words, such as homicide, suicide and patricide, all meaning a kind of killing.
Trace the full origin ↓Fill the gap
Can you complete this real example?
The play's plot turns on an act of _____.
Etymology
Matricide comes from French matricide, which in turn goes back to the Latin words mātricīda, meaning someone who kills their own mother, and mātricīdium, meaning the killing of one's mother. Taken apart, it combines matri-, relating to mother, with -cide, meaning killing.
