savagery
/ˈsavɪdʒ(ə)ri
/noun (plural savageries) [mass noun]
1The quality of being fierce or cruel: a crime of the utmost savagery she was treated with particular savagery by cartoonists...
- Christopher Tookey said the whole Protestant community was implicated in the gang's savagery.
- There were many revolts which were put down with incredible savagery.
- The dog represented an extension, even a vanguard, of man's savagery.
Synonyms
brutality, ferocity, fierceness, violence, viciousness, cruelty, sadism, barbarity, barbarousness, murderousness, bloodthirstiness, brutishness, mercilessness, ruthlessness, pitilessness, inhumanity, heartlessness
rare ferity
2(Chiefly in historical or literary contexts) the condition of being primitive or uncivilized: without adult society, the children descend into savagery the progress of civilization over savagery...
- Communication, except the more primitive kinds and the printed word were lost as survivors slipped backward toward savagery.
- Thus Darwin may have employed the word "savagery" to describe the cultural level of non-Europeans.
- White Americans began imagining African Americans as bestial examples of Africa's primitive savagery within the nation's borders.