cabal
pronunciation
How to pronounce cabal in British English:
UK [kəˈbæl]
How to pronounce cabal in American English:
US [kəˈbɑl]
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- Noun:
- a clique (often secret) that seeks power usually through intrigue
- a plot to carry out some harmful or illegal act (especially a political plot)
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- Verb:
- engage in plotting or enter into a conspiracy, swear together
Word Origin
- cabal (n.)
- 1520s, "mystical interpretation of the Old Testament," later "society, small group meeting privately" (1660s), from French cabal, in both senses, from Medieval Latin cabbala (see cabbala). Popularized in English 1673 as an acronym for five intriguing ministers of Charles II (Clifford, Arlington, Buckingham, Ashley, and Lauderdale), which gave the word its sinister connotations.
Example
- 1. Davos is often criticized as a cabal of the global elite .
- 2. The world 's most conservative scientific body has somehow been transformed into a cabal of screaming demagogues .
- 3. Anyone wanting companies run by a self-serving , self-recruiting cabal could hardly improve on this incestuous system .
- 4. So powerful did seward remain that he was targeted by the april 1865 cabal that killed lincoln , surviving with some nasty knife wounds .
- 5. They see a kleptocratic state , teetering on the edge of anarchy and serving only a ruling cabal of politicians , bureaucrats and the military men who operate in the shadows .