What does matricide mean?
Matricide is a formal and unusually grave noun for the killing of one's mother. It can also name the person who commits that killing, although the act or offense is usually the more common sense. In legal and historical writing, phrases such as “convicted of matricide” treat the word as the crime, while literary criticism may use it for the event and its psychological aftermath. It is not simply another term for the murder of an older woman: the specific relationship between killer and mother is essential to the meaning. The word's rarity and gravity give it a strong emotional charge, which is why it is most often encountered in serious writing about law, history, or literature. Matricide is useful because it identifies the victim relationship in a single, precise term. Unlike infanticide or fratricide, however, it cannot describe the killing of a symbolic or metaphorical mother; its ordinary meaning requires that the victim actually be the killer's mother.
nounThe crime of killing one's mother; also, by extension, a person who has killed their mother.
- The killing of one's mother.
- A person who has killed their own mother.
"The novel examines the guilt and silence that follow a matricide."
"The novel explores the guilt and silence that follow a matricide."
"He was convicted of matricide after the court found that he had deliberately killed his mother."
The plural is used when referring to multiple acts or offenses, or multiple people who have killed their mothers.
"The scholar compared two notorious matricides in nineteenth-century fiction."
Hidden inside the word is its addressee: Latin mater means “mother.”
Reviewed by Deb Chak, Editor. AI-assisted content curated by RJS Tech Solutions LLP.
Where does matricide come from?
Matricide entered English in the 16th century from French matricide, which was borrowed from Latin matricidium. The Latin compound was formed from mater, meaning “mother,” and a suffix related to caedere, meaning “to cut” or “to kill.” The same root mater also underlies words including maternal, matrimony, matrix, and matron.
Related word forms
How matricide is actually used
This is a formal, exceptionally grave term used chiefly in legal, historical, and literary contexts. Most usage denotes the act or offense; the sense naming the person who commits it is possible but less frequent.
Easily confused with matricide
Matricide is specifically the killing of one's mother, whereas parricide usually means the killing of one's father and can more broadly refer to the murder of a close relative.