noun
- Mass drownings, especially those carried out as executions or acts of violence during a period of civil unrest or war.
Usage: historical; plural form; singular is noyade; most commonly refers to the systematic drownings during the French Revolution in Nantes (1793–1794)
Examples
- The noyades of Nantes remain one of the darkest chapters of the French Revolution.
- Historians have documented the noyades as a deliberate method of execution used during the Reign of Terror.
- The term 'noyades' refers to the systematic drowning of prisoners in the Loire River.
- Revolutionary authorities justified the noyades as a means of eliminating political enemies.
- Survivors of the noyades provided harrowing accounts of the atrocities committed.