Definition of JUGGERNAUT

The History of Juggernaut

In the early 14th century, Franciscan missionary Friar Odoric brought to Europe the story of an enormous carriage that carried an image of the Hindu god Vishnu (whose title was Jagannath, literally, "lord of the world") through the streets of India in religious processions. Odoric reported that some worshippers deliberately allowed themselves to be crushed beneath the vehicle's wheels as a sacrifice to Vishnu. That story was probably an exaggeration or misinterpretation of actual events, but it spread throughout Europe anyway. The tale caught the imagination of English listeners, and by the 19th century, they were using juggernaut to refer to any massive vehicle (such as a steam locomotive) or to any other enormous entity with powerful crushing capabilities.

Examples of juggernaut in a Sentence

there was no escaping the juggernaut of hype for the studio's biggest summer blockbuster

Recent Examples on the Web

Disney, the parent of sports-TV juggernaut ESPN, is required by the Justice Department to sell the regional channels in return... — Miriam Gottfried, WSJ, "Fox Won’t Bid to Reacquire Its Regional Sports Networks From Disney," 11 Jan. 2019 Linda Kallerus/Netflix The greatest Marvel tragedy in recent memory was the limp debut of Iron Fist, the fourth of the entertainment juggernaut’s Netflix superhero shows. — Alex Abad-santos, Vox, "Iron Fist is better in season 2. It still needs work.," 6 Sep. 2018 YouTube is the juggernaut in online video, surpassing one billion hours watched a day in late 2016, and has become increasingly important to its parent company Google’s bottom line. — Jack Nicas, New York Times, "The Week in Tech: Silicon Valley Gets Even More Political," 22 June 2018 The entire cast of 13 Reasons Why became BFFs while filming season 1 of the Netflix juggernaut. — refinery29.com, "The Cutest Instagram Photos Of The 13 Reasons Why Cast," 22 May 2018 Perhaps their stories will prove to be irrelevant to the 2018 Warriors, who certainly wield as much talent and experience as most of the juggernauts that came before them. — Mike Finger, San Antonio Express-News, "History says Warriors could be due for letdown," 2 Apr. 2018 Patrick Varone, who hosts the web show Shot Topics, considers this fight the moment Pump went from just another reality show to Bravo’s nutcase juggernaut. — Danny Murphy, Marie Claire, "9 Dramatic 'Vanderpump Rules' Moments Nobody Can Ever Forget," 3 Dec. 2018 Airbnb’s meteoric climb from small startup to multibillion-dollar hospitality juggernaut has seen the short-term rental service closely associated with cities. — Patrick Sisson, Curbed, "How vacation homes went from private escape to investment opportunities," 2 Oct. 2018 Benetton, founded in 1965 as a family company, grew into an international juggernaut with thousands of outlets worldwide and a reputation for pushing the envelope while championing diversity in its images. — Ceylan Yeginsu, New York Times, "Benetton ‘Migrants’ Ads Draw Outrage for Using Photos of Real Migrants," 21 June 2018

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'juggernaut.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.