Definition, CEFR level C1, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
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Definition
nounThe unordered state of matter in classical accounts of cosmogony.
nounAny state of disorder; a confused or amorphous mixture or conglomeration.
Sentence Examples
There will be chaos unless we all adhere to the rules.
The entire theater turned to chaos when somebody cried "Fire!".
His sudden departure threw the office into chaos.
CEFR Practice Quiz
When the fire alarm rang, the students ran in all directions, causing complete ____ in the hallways.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The sudden power failure caused complete ____ in the whole city.
Word Origin & History
Etymology tree
Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰeh₂-der.
Ancient Greek χαῦνος (khaûnos)
Ancient Greek χάος (kháos)lbor.
English chaos
Learned borrowing from Ancient Greek χάος (kháos, “vast chasm, void”). Doublet of gas, which was borrowed through Dutch. Displaced native Old English dwolma.
In Early Modern English, used in the sense of the original Greek word. In the meaning “primordial matter” from the 16th century. Figurative usage in the sense “confusion, disorder” from the 17th century. The technical sense in mathematics and science dates from the 1960s.
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"or out of these chaoses order may be made, out of this ferment a clear wine of life. There are chaoses that have gone too far for retrieval"
— 1977, Irwin Edman, Adam, the Baby, and the Man from Mars, page 54:
"What is in the centre of the earth, or is it pure element only, as Ariſtotle decrees inhabited as Paracelſus thinks with creatures, whoſe Chaos is the earth with Fairies, as the woods and waters according to him, are with Nymphes or as the ayre with ſpirits."
— 1621, Democritus Junior [pseudonym; Robert Burton], “Aire rectified. With a digression of the Aire.”, in The Anatomy of Melancholy, […], Oxford, Oxfordshire: […] John Lichfield and Iames Short, for Henry Cripps, →OCLC, partition 2, section 2, member 3, page 320: