to put to death, especially by hanging, by mob action and without legal authority.
In the 19th and 20th centuries, thousands of southern African Americans were lynched by white mobs.
to criticize, condemn, etc., in public.
He’s been unfairly lynched in the media.
David. born 1946, US film director; his work includes the films Eraserhead (1977), Blue Velvet (1986), Wild at Heart (1990), Mulholland Drive (2001), and Inland Empire (2006), and the television series Twin Peaks (1990)
John, known as Jack Lynch. 1917–99, Irish statesman; prime minister of the Republic of Ireland (1966–73; 1977–79)
See hang.
An Americanism first recorded in 1825–35; verb use of lynch in lynch law
To lynch is to murder, or unlawfully kill. When an angry mob kills someone they believe is guilty of a crime, they lynch that person. Through history, when a group of people murders someone, especially by hanging him by the neck, they are usually said to lynch him. This was unfortunately not uncommon during the Civil Rights struggle of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries in the American South: if a white community believed an African American had done something wrong, they would sometimes lynch him. Lynch is named after Justice Charles Lynch, who condoned mob justice during the American Revolution.
Looking to grow your vocabulary? Check out this interactive, curated word list from our team of English language specialists at Vocabulary.com – one of over 17,000 lists we've built to help learners worldwide!
Interested in learning more words like this one? Our team at Vocabulary.com has got you covered! You can review flashcards, quiz yourself, practice spelling, and more – and it's all completely free to use!
Want to remember this word for good? Start your learning journey today with our library of interactive, themed word lists built by the experts at Vocabulary.com – we'll help you make the most of your study time!
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
I have always been interested in the psychology of lynch mobs.
From Seattle Times ● May 4, 2023
In 1962, the white lawyer in “To Kill a Mockingbird” confronts a lynch mob intent on hanging his client, an innocent Black man, later telling the jury, “In our courts, all men are created equal.”
From New York Times ● Sep. 7, 2022
Angry readers wrote to The Times in response to my favorable review of the series, insisting I was part of a lynch mob: “Shame on you!”
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 14, 2021
Fair and open elections are the lynch pin of our democracy.
From Washington Times ● Feb. 27, 2019
“Oh, that. Well, to hear the Post tell it, we lynch ’em for breakfast; the Journal doesn’t care; and the Times is so wrapped up in its duty to posterity it bores you to death.
From "Go Set a Watchman: A Novel" by Harper Lee
And the lower the SPR gets, the more traders are going to “worry that oil will not be available, even if the technical minimum hasn’t been reached,” said Lynch.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 15, 2026
Stanford didn’t respond to a request for comment on behalf of Lynch.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 14, 2026
Listening to Xiu Xiu’s “Eraserhead” on a hot and stormy Friday afternoon is an atavistic summoning of the many gifts that David Lynch left us to remember him by.
From Salon ● Jul. 10, 2026
Lynch, the former star running back for the Seattle Seahawks and Oakland Raiders, obliged by getting hailed on by a bucket of ice.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 2, 2026
“Some of our colleagues seem to have gone seriously wrong,” lamented Thomas F. Lynch of Texas A&M in the Review of Archaeology in 2001.
From "1491" by Charles C. Mann
US President Joe Biden established a national monument to honour Emmett Till, a black teenager who was lynched in 1955 in Mississippi, and his mother, Mamie Till-Mobley, on Tuesday.
From BBC ● Jul. 25, 2023
“Leopoldstadt” went on to win best play, while best musical revival went to another searing work about antisemitism: “Parade,” starring Ben Platt as Leo Frank, a Jewish man who was lynched in 1915 in Georgia.
From Seattle Times ● Jun. 12, 2023
The white woman who accused Black teenager Emmett Till of making improper advances before he was lynched in Mississippi in 1955 has died in hospice care in Louisiana, a coroner’s report shows.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 27, 2023
You do not expect the star of a musical about a man lynched by an antisemitic mob to be his wife.
From New York Times ● Mar. 16, 2023
As of 1920, about 13 out of every 100 black children died in infancy, or roughly 20,000 children each year—compared to 28 people who were lynched in a year.
From "Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything" by Steven D. Levitt
In spite of all that, Diddy's mother recently defended her son on Sunday and accused the media and others of engaging in a "public lynching."
From Salon ● Oct. 11, 2024
The law makes lynching a federal hate crime.
From Seattle Times ● Sep. 9, 2023
The accusations featured in the 2019 documentary Leaving Neverland, which Jackson's family described as a "public lynching".
From BBC ● Aug. 19, 2023
He also said that signing the Emmett Till Antilynching Act, which made lynching a federal hate crime, in March 2022, was “one of the great honors of my career.”
From New York Times ● Jul. 25, 2023
Also, we worked on reports and materials that seek to deepen the national conversation about the legacy of slavery and lynching and our nation's history of racial injustice.
From "Just Mercy" by Bryan Stevenson
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
