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drunken revelry

drunken revelry

7.9
A loud party where people drink too much and act wild
  • noun
  • /ˈdrʌŋkən ˈrɛvəlri/
translation icon : revelry borracha
  • After the wedding, the guests flooded into the streets for a night of drunken revelry, laughing and dancing wildly.
  • a night of drunken revelry

Your, your leaders are sitting in drunken revelry and so on and so forth.

Examples

  • A night of drunken revelry in the tiny Cree settlement of 208 persons ended with two men dead and one woman, 15, suffering gunshot wounds in the face.

    Academic text (2007)
  • Work is suspended, and the celebrants give themselves over to drunken revelry (Violence 119).

    Academic text (1993)
  • Your, your leaders are sitting in drunken revelry and so on and so forth.

  • But you can just stay and, you know, start a life of drunken revelry with Zofia for all I care.

  • The narrator's uncle curses the bird when he learns how it was acquired after a night of drunken revelry.

    Academic text (2007)
  • The streets were alive with the sounds of drunken revelry as the party went on until dawn.

  • As the evening progressed, the drunken revelry escalated, with cheers and music echoing throughout the neighborhood.

Synonyms

debauchery
vsdrunken revelry
  • NSFW
18 9.1

Too much drinking and sex for pleasure

is focused on noisy celebration and wild behavior rather than general indulgence
riot
vsdrunken revelry
  • NSFW
16 5.3

A wild noisy party where people drink a lot

is similar but often implies disorder or violence beyond partying
revelry
vsdrunken revelry
9 6.1

Lively noisy party with drinking and dancing

is identical but stresses wild uninhibited behavior and excess drinking
rager
vsdrunken revelry
  • Slang
8 8.9

A loud, wild party with many people and music

is the same idea but emphasizes excessive drinking and uninhibited conduct
revel
vsdrunken revelry
5 6.3

A loud happy party with dancing and drinking

is similar but focuses more on steady enjoyment than extreme excess
bacchanal
vsdrunken revelry
  • NSFW
3 9.9

A wild party with a lot of drinking and loud, out-of-control behavior

is the same but focuses more on noisy public partying than sex
bacchanalia
vsdrunken revelry
  • NSFW
1 9.9

A wild party with a lot of drinking, dancing, and people having sex

is similar but used more generally for noisy drinking parties
debauch
vsdrunken revelry
  • NSFW
1 9.9

A wild party with much drinking and sex

is similar but stresses noisy public celebration rather than private indulgence
saturnalia
vsdrunken revelry
  • NSFW
1 9.9

A time of wild, noisy partying with much drinking and dancing

is the same but often means a longer period rather than one event
carousal
vsdrunken revelry
  • Archaic
9.8

A noisy party where people drink and have fun

is broader covering any noisy celebration with wild excess
wild bender
vsdrunken revelry
  • Informal
9.6

A period of heavy drinking and dangerous behavior lasting hours or days

is similar but usually means a single noisy celebration not a prolonged drinking spell

How Wild

riot
329 4.1
drunken revelry
7.9
revelry
9 6.1
party
1.0
celebration
430 1.0
get-together
  • Informal
46 1.9

Surface Forms

Morphology

drunken + revelry

The meaning is directly and transparently derived from combining 'drunken' (having consumed alcohol) with 'revelry' (noisy celebration); a learner who knows both words will infer a celebration involving drinking. This modifier-noun composition is a standard, cross-linguistic pattern and therefore readily comprehensible to a B1 learner.

Etymology

The phrase drunken revelry combines drunken meaning people who are very drunk and revelry meaning a loud, joyful 'celebration'. One strong image is of festival crowds drinking and dancing loudly in the streets until things got out of control, so drunken revelry now means a noisy, wild 'party' caused by too much drinking.