KILLER

killer

(noun) a difficulty that is hard to deal with; “that exam was a real killer”

killer, slayer

(noun) someone who causes the death of a person or animal

Source: WordNet® 3.1

---

Etymology

Noun

killer (countable and uncountable, plural killers)

One who or that which kills.

(figuratively) That which causes stress or is extremely difficult, especially that which may cause failure at a task.

(figuratively) Something that is so far ahead of its competition that it effectively kills off that competition.

(sports, uncountable) A knockout form of darts or pool involving several players.

The killer whale.

A club used for killing fish.

(philately) A particularly heavy type of handstamp, or portion of one, often obscuring a large part of the postage stamp.

A diacritic mark used in Indic scripts to suppress an inherent vowel (e.g, the Hindi viram, the Bengali or Oriya hasanta) or render the entire syllable silent (e.g, the Burmese virama, the Khmer toandakhiat).

• So, for example, an invisible ǎthaq “killer” (virama) (U+1039) is not inserted between initial and medial consonants. — https://web.archive.org/web/20080920231021/http://mercury.soas.ac.uk/wadict/burmese/SOASMyanmar_keyboard_and_font_user_manual.pdf

• We have previously shown that there is no “virama” sign as a general “killer” in Khmer script, unlike, for example, in Devanagari script. — http://std.dkuug.dk/jtc1/sc2/wg2/docs/n2458.pdf

• The virama U+1039 MYANMAR SIGN VIRAMA also participates in some common constructions where it appears as a visible sign, commonly termed killer. — https://web.archive.org/web/20090220092509/http://www.myanmarnlp.net.mm/doc/20010714_implementation_draungmaw1.PPT

• In the course of its adaptation to non-Indo-Aryan languages, the Burmese script has acquired some features that distinguish it from other Indic scripts. The killer, or virama, participates in some common constructions that would be clumsy to handle the way they would be in the other Indic scripts, so the control function of the virama is separated from the diacritic function of the killer. The virama, 0F4D is used to form conjunct consonants, while the killer, 0F52, is a simple diacritic and has no effect on character shaping. The killer is also combined with the VOWEL SIGN O (0F4B) to form the low level tone vowel “o.” When used this way, this symbol is known as hyei hto, or “thrust forward.” — http://unicode.org/reports/tr1.html

• For example, although the ‘vowel killer’ diacritic may be called a ‘pulli’ in Tamil, it is still referred to by the Unicode character names as a ‘virama’. — http://www.w3.org/2002/Talks/09-ri-indic/indic-paper.html

• Thai words that have been borrowed from Sanskrit, Pali and English usually try to retain as much of the original spelling as possible; as this will often produce pronunciations that are impossible or misleading, a ‘killer’ symbol is placed above the redundant consonant to indicate that it may be ignored — Thai: An Essential Grammar By David Smyth

• Sometimes the ‘killer’ sign, called kaaran in Thai, cancels out not only the consonant above which it appears, but also the one immediately preceding it. — Thai: An Essential Grammar By David Smyth

Synonyms

• (that which kills): assassin, murderer; see also killer

• (diacritic): virama, halant, vowel killer

Adjective

killer (comparative more killer, superlative most killer)

(slang) Excellent, very good, cool.

Causing death, destruction, or obliteration.

Distressing, uncomfortable.

Usage notes

• In the sense of causing death or distress, killer is seldom used attributively.

Anagrams

• rekill

Source: Wiktionary

---

Kill"er, n.

1. One who deprives of life; one who, or that which, kills.

2. (Zoöl.)

Definition: A voracious, toothed whale of the genus Orca, of which several species are known.

Note: The killers have a high dorsal fin, and powerful jaws armed with large, sharp teeth. They capture, and swallow entire, large numbers of seals, porpoises, and dolphins, and are celebrated for their savage, combined attacks upon the right whales, which they are said to mutilate and kill. The common Atlantic species (Orca gladiator), is found both on the European and the American coast. Two species (Orca ater and O. rectipinna) occur on the Pacific coast.

Source: Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary 1913 Edition

---

Do you know this game?

Wordscapes is a popular word game consistently in the top charts of both Google Play Store and Apple App Store. The Android version has more than 10 million installs. This guide will help you get more coins in less than two minutes of playing the game. Continue reading Wordscapes: Get More Coins