cesspool

[ses-pool]

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noun

a cistern, well, or pit for retaining the sediment of a drain or for receiving the sewage from a house.

any filthy receptacle or place.

any place of moral filth or immorality: a cesspool of iniquity.

Origin of cesspool

1575–85; cess (< Italian cesso privy < Latin rēcessus recess, place of retirement) + pool¹

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Related Words for cesspool

cesspit, sump

Examples from the Web for cesspool

Contemporary Examples of cesspool

On another, more macro level, did you find Europe to be such a cesspool of intrigue?
How The Cold War Endgame Played Out In The Rubble Of The Berlin Wall
William O’Connor
November 9, 2014
The vote on Sunday could take Ukraine toward a modern functioning democracy or plunge it back into a cesspool of corruption.
Ukraine’s Wild and Wooly Elections
Anna Nemtsova
October 24, 2014
It allows me to stomach the pathetic shenanigans of the cesspool of Washington, D.C.
Roland Martin: America, You Can’t Handle the Truth!
Roland S. Martin
January 19, 2014
In the cesspool of cynicism that is Indian politics, we thought his train ride struck a blow instead for a degree of idealism.
How Rahul Gandhi Blew the Indian Rape Crisis
Dilip D’Souza
January 19, 2013
It's perpetuating a cesspool on Facebook for those who would perpetuate real world violence and rape.
Should Facebook Ban Sexist Pages?
Jessica Bennett
November 5, 2011

Historical Examples of cesspool

Scattering flowers upon a cesspool of iniquity will not purify it.
Gipsy Life
George Smith
I should be the first to be ready to clean out any cesspool you like.
Crime and Punishment
Fyodor Dostoevsky
The "cesspool question" had already been a subject of dispute between them.
Crime and Punishment
Fyodor Dostoevsky
When we pass a cesspool we close our noses and try not to breathe.
A Family of Noblemen
Mikhal Saltykov
All the vice and misery of the country got thrown into that cesspool.
Ravenshoe
Henry Kingsley

British Dictionary definitions for cesspool

cesspool

cesspit (ˈsɛsˌpɪt)

noun

Also called: sink, sump a covered cistern, etc, for collecting and storing sewage or waste water

a filthy or corrupt placea cesspool of iniquity

Word Origin for cesspool

C17: changed (through influence of pool 1) from earlier cesperalle, from Old French souspirail vent, air, from soupirer to sigh; see suspire

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Word Origin and History for cesspool

also cess-pool, 1670s, the first element perhaps an alteration of cistern, perhaps a shortened form of recess [Klein]; or the whole may be an alteration of suspiral (c.1400), "drainpipe," from Old French sospiral "a vent, air hole," from sospirer "breathe," from Latin suspirare "breathe deep" [Barnhart]. Meaning extended to "tank at the end of the pipe," which would account for a possible folk-etymology change in final syllable.

Other possible etymologies: Italian cesso "privy," from Latin secessus "place of retirement" (in Late Latin "privy, drain"); dialectal suspool, from suss, soss "puddle;" or cess "a bog on the banks of a tidal river."