Vandalism

How to spell vandalism

9 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce vandalism

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does vandalism mean?

1. nounThe deliberate destruction or defacement of property belonging to others.

Vandalism in a sentence

• The council spent thousands repairing the vandalism in the underground car park.

• Smashed bus shelters and spray-painted walls are everyday vandalism in the town centre.

Where does vandalism come from?

Language of origin: French

This word grew out of the name of the Vandals, a Germanic people who swept across Europe and famously sacked Rome in the year 455, leaving a lasting reputation for wanton destruction. The tribal name itself comes from the Latin Vandalus, the form Roman writers used for these invaders. The abstract noun was actually coined in French as vandalisme in 1794, when Henri Gregoire, a bishop active during the French Revolution, used it to condemn the deliberate ruin of artworks and monuments. English borrowed the French coinage almost immediately, keeping the sense of needless damage to property. The spelling trap lies in the soft middle: the second syllable is an unstressed schwa, so writers are tempted to put an 'e' where the original tribal name keeps an 'a'.

How the word is built

• Vandal (the Germanic tribe notorious for destruction)
• -ism (noun suffix denoting a practice or behaviour)