1. mass execution by drowning, especially as practiced during the French Revolution
Usage: historical

Examples

• The noyades at Nantes were among the most brutal episodes of the Reign of Terror.
• Carrier ordered the noyade of prisoners by loading them onto barges that were then sunk in the Loire River.
• Historians estimate that thousands died in the noyades of 1793-1794.
• The noyade represented one of the most systematic forms of mass execution during the Revolution.
• Revolutionary tribunals sometimes sentenced enemies of the state to death by noyade.
• The practice of noyade was eventually condemned even by other revolutionary leaders.