MADHOUSE • DICCIONARIO INGLES.COM • Definition of Madhouse

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/mˈædhˌaʊs/ Listen

noun

Madhouse n.

An house or institution where insane persons are confined; an insane asylum; a bedlam; usually used in a deprecatory sense.

Synonyms: Bedlam, booby hatch, crazy house, cuckoo's nest, funny farm, funny house, insane asylum, loony bin, nuthouse, sanatorium.

Hence: (fig.) A chaotic, raucus or highly disordered situation.

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Etymology of 'Madhouse'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Madhouse" Quotes from Famous Books

... Pelton's commercial empire, Generalissimo in the perpetual war against Macy & Gimbel's. From that viewpoint, the sale was excellent business—Latterman had gotten the jump on all the other department stores for the winter fashions and fall sports trade. He had also turned the store into a madhouse at the exact time when Chester Pelton needed to give all ...

— Null-ABC • Henry Beam Piper and John Joseph McGuire

... scheme, indeed. Hawkins seems to have considered that his duty—which was merely to keep intruders out of the park—was dictated by necessity. He thought that if Lady Coverly's real condition became known she would be removed to a madhouse! He also thought that ...

— The Green Eyes of Bast • Sax Rohmer

... Club du Preaux-Clercs in the Rue du Bac, the Club de la Cour des Miracles on the Ile Saint Louis, and twenty or thirty others of lesser note. At times the demagogues who perorated from the tribunes at these gatherings, brought forward proposals which seemed to have emanated from some madhouse, but which were nevertheless hailed with delirious applause by their infatuated audiences. Occasionally new engines of destruction were advocated—so-called "Satan-fusees," or pumps discharging flaming petroleum! Another speaker conceived the brilliant idea of keeping all ...

— My Days of Adventure - The Fall of France, 1870-71 • Ernest Alfred Vizetelly

... naked and raving through the streets, shrieking "Wo, wo, wo! the wrath of God, the wrath of God!" When arrested, they obstinately refused to put on clothing. "We are," they observed, "the naked truth." In a day or two, these furious lunatics, who certainly deserved a madhouse rather than the scaffold, were all executed. The numbers of the sect increased with the martyrdom to which they were exposed, and the disorder spread to every part of the Netherlands. Many were put to death in lingering torments, but no perceptible effect was produced ...

— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... to persuade Jane to beg pardon," said Mrs. Pullet. "Her temper's beyond everything; it's well if it doesn't carry her off her mind, though there never was any of our family went to a madhouse." ...

— The Mill on the Floss • George Eliot

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