xenocide

Definition

The killing of a stranger or foreigner.

Etymology

From xeno- + -cide.

Example Sentences

• "As notorious examples of ritual xenocide, suffice it to mention the foreigners sacrificed on the altar of the goddess Artemis in Colchis, on the eastern shore of the Black Sea (Diodorus Siculus, Bibliotheca Historica, 4.45) as well as the ritual of beheading strangers when the reaping season drew to a close, performed by the legendary Lityerses, king of Phyrgia. [...] [In] an act of ritual xenocide in a Cossack villafe [...] Cossacks kill a Turkish woman[.]"
• "The age that began with one xenocide attempted had now ended with other xenocides prevented or, at least, postponed."