kinslayer

Etymology

From kin + slayer.

Why this word is great

KINSLAYER — [Noun] One who slays his or her own kin; a parricide. From kin ("family, relatives") + slayer ("one who kills"). Unlike "kingslayer" (which denotes the killing of a monarch, not necessarily a relative) or "parricide" (which legally narrows to the murder of a parent), "kinslayer" carries the weight of blood betrayal in its broadest, most mythic sense. It is the brother raising a blade to his brother in the dim light of a feasting hall, the mother weeping as she drowns her child in the river, the son turning his back on the hearth to burn the family home—acts so unnatural they fracture not just lives, but the very order of the world. To slay one’s own is to sever the first and final tether.

noun

  1. One who slays his or her own kin; a parricide.“Associated by the poet with Cain, primordial kinslayer and therefore symbol of elemental social disunity, he stalks abroad, ravaging only by night...”