Holodomor

//ˌhɒlədəˈmɔː(ɹ)// name

name ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Proper Noun
  1. 1
    The 1932–33 famine affecting rural Ukraine and other territories of the Soviet Union, a result of the forced collectivization of land-owning peasants by the Soviet government. historical

    "In 1928 the village was divided into kulaks, middle-peasants, and poor peasants: "this was the beginning of the planned murder-famine (holodomor).""

  2. 2
    А famine with mass deaths, especially one of the Soviet famines in 1921–22, 1932–33, or 1946–47. historical, rare

    "Some of the publications of the Association’s regional branches are also steeped in xenophobia and anti-Semitism (for example, the proceedings of the 2003 Kharkiv conference “The Holodomors in Ukraine: Reasons, Victims, Perpetrators”)."

Synonyms

All synonyms
artificial faminefamine genocidefamine-genocidegolodomorgreat faminegreat famine

Example

More examples

"The Holodomor is widely recognised as genocide."

Etymology

Late 1980s, from Ukrainian Голодомо́р (Holodomór), from го́лод (hólod, “hunger, famine”) + мор (mor, “mass death, exhaustion”). Compare мори́ти (morýty, “kill by hunger or exhaustion”, verb). Not related to Holocaust.

Related phrases

great purge

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.