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Plague-Ridden

Disease
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

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The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

Overrun or devastated by plague or widespread disease. It suggests collective suffering and abandoned social order.

Detailed Definition
Plague-ridden presents disease not as a private ailment but as a condition that remakes an entire place. In poetry, a plague-ridden town may have silent streets, barred doors, emptied markets, tolling bells, and survivors estranged from one another. The phrase can also be figurative, applying the scale and terror of epidemic illness to violence, injustice, or despair. Its emphasis falls on saturation: the affliction seems to occupy every household and horizon.
Example
Example in poetry:
“The plague-ridden port kept its ships beyond the bay” establishes quarantine and communal fear; “Plague-ridden houses stared with boarded eyes” personifies abandoned buildings; A poet may write, “In the plague-ridden year, even birds seemed to mourn at a distance,” to show isolation; “Her plague-ridden thoughts multiplied after midnight” uses the phrase figuratively for invasive despair
Additional Notes
Plague-ridden emphasizes communal devastation rather than one patient’s illness. It can frame deserted streets, broken rituals, and the failure of social order.
Also Known As
Plague-Stricken Pestilence-Ridden
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