Abaddon

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A place of destruction and ruin, or in religious contexts, the angel or demon of the abyss and annihilation
2. A site embodying devastation and chaos, or a spiritual entity linked to extreme destruction and the abyss
3. A location characterized by utter desolation and disaster, or in certain religious beliefs, an entity representing extreme ruin and the depths of oblivion

Etymology: "Abaddon" is one of the few words in English that began life as a proper name for a place, and it was a place of ruin before it was anything else. The Hebrew "ābaddōn" meant "destruction" or "abyss," coming from the verb "ābad," "to be lost, to perish." In the Hebrew Bible it appears as a term for the realm of the dead or a place of destruction, and the Greek translators of the Septuagint rendered it with a form that became the name used in the Greek New Testament. The word reached English through Late Latin and Middle English, but the sense of a personified being came later. In the New Testament's Book of Revelation, Abaddon is named as the angel of the bottomless pit, a destroying king, and that identity gave the word its religious meaning as a demonic figure of annihilation. Its use as a common noun for any scene of ruin is a later development, which is why it still carries both the sense of a specific infernal place and a broader sense of desolation.