thunderbolt
Americannoun
-
a flash of lightning with the accompanying thunder.
-
an imaginary bolt or dart conceived as the material destructive agent cast to earth in a flash of lightning.
the thunderbolts of Jove.
-
something very destructive, terrible, severe, sudden, or startling.
-
a person who acts with fury or with sudden and irresistible force.
noun
-
a flash of lightning accompanying thunder
-
the imagined agency of destruction produced by a flash of lightning
-
(in mythology) the destructive weapon wielded by several gods, esp the Greek god Zeus See also Thor
-
something very startling
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of thunderbolt
First recorded in 1400–50, thunderbolt is from late Middle English thondre bolte. See thunder, bolt 1
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Cameroon also fell behind, against Mozambique in Agadir, but a thunderbolt from Christian Kofane delivered a 2-1 victory.
From Barron's • Dec. 31, 2025
The attack fell like a thunderbolt on the country’s tightly knit Jewish community.
From The Wall Street Journal • Dec. 15, 2025
That’s why the revision by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention of its advisory on vaccines and autism struck like a thunderbolt, and not in a good way.
From Los Angeles Times • Nov. 25, 2025
The higher-for-longer inflation predicament has hit the U.S. housing market like a thunderbolt.
From New York Times • Apr. 12, 2024
He’d gone a little different with the Mohawk too, buzzing it close to his scalp and jagging it so it looked like a thunderbolt.
From "Burning Blue" by Paul Griffin
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.
