hell on earth
9
6.8
- idiom
- Informal
:
un infierno en la tierra
- Living in a war zone can be described as hell on earth for many families who have lost everything.
- living in hell on earth
- life can be hell on earth
If you want a hell on earth, go look at the children in Gaza.
- If you want a hell on earth, go look at the children in Gaza.
- Second of all, festivals are my hell on earth.
- You know, I started the detox and it was like hell on earth.
- And then you go to a Palestinian town and it looks like hell on earth.
- It's either, you know, it's either a healing space or it's, or it's hell on earth, right?
- And then when we went to Montserrat for Ghost and the Machine, our fourth album, it was hell on earth.
- And yeah, I can honestly say as somebody who has fought in three wars, I've been through all kinds of hell on earth.
- Another is what I called hell on earth.
Examples
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When the floodwaters rose, the aftermath was truly hell on earth for the residents of the town.
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For those caught in the wildfire, each moment felt like hell on earth as they struggled to escape.
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There is a reason why this prison is the worst hell on earth: Hope.
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This is hell on earth.
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The fact is that my marriage has been hell on earth.
Fiction book (2000) -
War is hell on earth, just ask anyone who was in one.
Blog text (11) -
This is pure hell on earth.
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Who you love can either make your life heaven on earth or hell on earth.
Blog text (18) -
As civilized people, we MUST come together against them or our future will be hell on earth.
Blog text (5) -
Derek is bitter about the tourist invasion; it's hell on earth, he says, from July through September.
Fiction book (1993)
Synonyms
∞
3.7
A very painful or difficult experience
51
7.9
A very dirty, unpleasant, and dangerous place
14
9.0
A temporary state of painful waiting before things get better
7
8.2
A situation of great danger and destruction, like war or a big fire
5
8.8
A very bad situation that makes you feel unhappy
Antonyms
How Miserable
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning is directly inferable by combining 'hell' (a place of intense suffering) with 'on Earth' (located in the world), so a learner who knows the constituents can readily understand it as describing a situation or place of extreme misery. This metaphorical mapping is transparent and common across languages, following a straightforward compositional pattern rather than an unpredictable idiom.
Etymology
Hell on earth gives a strong picture: something from hell is happening on earth, so the place feels full of pain and chaos. That's why it means 'a place of intense suffering'.