• Today's Word

Malediction

🔊 Listen to the word Malediction

mal-eh-DIK-shun

Definition

(noun) A spoken curse or expression of malicious intent directed against a person or group.

Example

The ousted king’s malediction against his betrayers was so elaborate and public that historians still reference it as one of the ancient world’s most theatrical acts of revenge.

Word Origin

Malediction derives from the Latin maledictio, meaning “evil speaking,” built from malus (“bad” or “evil”) and dicere (“to speak” or “to say”). The same root dicere gives us diction, dictate, predict, and verdict — a family of words all built around the act of speaking. Its direct opposite is benediction — “good speaking” — still used today in religious ceremonies as a formal blessing, making malediction and benediction precise linguistic mirror images of each other.

Fun Fact

In ancient Rome, curse tablets — thin sheets of lead inscribed with maledictions and buried near temples, graves, or thrown into sacred springs — were a thriving industry. Thousands have been recovered by archaeologists across the former Roman Empire, their targets ranging from chariot race rivals to unfaithful lovers to business competitors. The tablets were addressed directly to underworld deities, asking them to deliver specific, often elaborate punishments. One recovered from Roman Bath in England curses a thief who stole a cloak so comprehensively — listing every possible gender and social status the thief might be — that historians have cited it as evidence of remarkable ancient legal thoroughness. The Romans, it turns out, took their maledictions very seriously indeed.