Meaning of out-Herod | Babel Free

Definitions

To surpass in evil and cruelty.

Examples

“I could haue ſuch a Fellow whipt for o're-doing Termagant: it out-Herod's Herod. Pray you auoid it.”

“nor is his tone anything like⟳ so venomous as Carlyle's in that unpleasing essay on Cagliostro, in which he threw all decency to the winds and out-Heroded the Inquisition whilst ranting against it.”

“The farther and the longer away from his native country, the more he out-Heroded Artemus Ward and Petroleum V. Nasby.”

“Knowing that it is easier to convert the children than their elders, the Government of Nicholas I, out-Heroding Herod, inaugurated a system so cruel as to fill⟳ with terror and pity the heart of the most ferocious barbarian.”

CEFR level