quagmire

[kwag-mahyuhr, kwog-]

SEE MORE SYNONYMS FOR quagmire ON THESAURUS.COM

noun

an area of miry or boggy ground whose surface yields under the tread; a bog.

a situation from which extrication is very difficult: a quagmire of financial indebtedness.

anything soft or flabby.

Nearby words

Origin of quagmire

First recorded in 1570–80; quag + mire

Related formsquag·mir·y, adjective

Synonyms for quagmire

SEE MORE SYNONYMS FOR quagmire ON THESAURUS.COM

2. predicament, dilemma, quandary, scrape, jam.

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

Examples from the Web for quagmire

And the reasons for that suggest just how densely complicated the Mideast quagmire has become.
Obama’s Arab Backers May Draw the U.S. Deep Into the Mideast Quagmire|Jamie Dettmer|September 25, 2014|DAILY BEAST
Creator David Simon meant the line to be a reference to the quagmire of the Iraq War.
Who’s Really ‘Winning’ the Government Shutdown Debate|Jamelle Bouie|October 4, 2013|DAILY BEAST
Four years later, he has absented himself utterly from the quagmire in which nearly 90 million Egyptians find themselves.
What’s Left of Obama’s Mideast Policy?|Marty Peretz|July 18, 2013|DAILY BEAST
In the 1980s the goal was to defeat the Soviets by creating a quagmire for the Red Army like Vietnam was for America.
Will Arming Syrian Rebels Lead to Disaster?|Bruce Riedel|June 15, 2013|DAILY BEAST

Let's keep it like that, rather than sliding into a quagmire that renders it useless to the republic.
Harry Reid's Good Idea: Kill Filibusters on Appointments|Justin Green|May 17, 2013|DAILY BEAST
Octavian scrambled hastily over the pigsty wall to her rescue, and at once found himself in a quagmire that engulfed his feet.
The Toys of Peace|Saki
I watched her until I got tired, and then I thought I would take her missing stocking and throw it in the quagmire.
Little Mr. Thimblefinger and His Queer Country|Joel Chandler Harris
Quagmire, kwag′mīr, n. wet, boggy ground that yields under the feet.
Chambers's Twentieth Century Dictionary (part 3 of 4: N-R)|Various
My feet were entangled among briars and thorns, and beside me was a quagmire.
The Divine Adventure etc. (Works vol. 4)|Fiona Macleod
Neglect them, and you sink into the quagmire from which the soul of the race has been for generations struggling to save you.
The History of David Grieve|Mrs. Humphry Ward

British Dictionary definitions for quagmire

quagmire

noun

a soft wet area of land that gives way under the feet; bog

an awkward, complex, or embarrassing situation

Word Origin for quagmire

C16: from quag + mire

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 quagmire

1570s, "bog, marsh," from obsolete quag "bog, marsh" + mire (n.). Early spellings include quamyre (1550s), quabmire (1590s), quadmire (c.1600). Extended sense of "difficult situation, inescapable bad position" is recorded by 1766; but this seems to have been not in common use in much of 19c. (absent in "Century Dictionary," 1902), but revived in a narrower sense in reference to military invasions in American English, 1965, with reference to Vietnam (popularized in the book title "The Making of a Quagmire" by David Halberstam).