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Definition of "alarum" []

  • A warning or alarm, especially a call to arms: "This instrument called television can teach and illuminate, cautioned Edward R. Murrow, but only to the extent that its operators choose to use it.... An era later ... Murrow's alarum remains as up to date as tonight's news” ( Harry F. Waters). (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Use "alarum" in a sentence
  • ""The Signalman" by Charles Dickens (1866) This perfectly balanced, beautifully judged story both preys on both the anxiety provoked by the new technology of railways and deeply held beliefs that a ghost can be an alarum for events to follow."
  • "I'm not trying to ring the alarum bells like Margaret Someville, for whom every advance in medicine and genetics threatens damnation."
  • "Congress referred this alarum to a committee, and in conference with the Financier decided that still another circular would be pointless."