Definitions
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun a dungeon (20 feet square) in a fort in Calcutta where as many as 146 English prisoners were held overnight by Siraj-ud-daula; the next morning only 23 were still alive
Etymologies
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Examples
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-- The Black Hole of Calcutta is an object lesson of how necessary to life is the renewal of the air supply.
Papers on Health John Kirk
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The Old Bird no longer compared the atmosphere, when we were all shut in tight, with the Black Hole of Calcutta.
Life in a Tank Richard Haigh
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The Black Hole of Calcutta, of which you have read so much, no longer exists.
Modern India William Eleroy Curtis 1880
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Twenty-three ghastly figures staggered out of the charnel-house, one hundred and twenty-three bodies were hastily thrown into a pit and covered up, and the Black Hole of Calcutta has gone into history as a synonym for all that is dreadful and all that is possible in human suffering.
Ten Great Events in History James Johonnot 1855
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During the long coverage of the case, television anchors in the U.S. seemed to display contempt of Knox's treatment, in tones akin to that of a British colonial officer standing over the Black Hole of Calcutta.
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