juggernaut
noun
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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 Jagannāth, 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 likely an exaggeration or misinterpretation of actual events, but it spread throughout Europe. The tale caught the imagination of English listeners, and they began using juggernaut to refer to any massive vehicle (such as a steam locomotive) and to any other enormous entity with powerful crushing capabilities. While the word is still used sometimes in British English to refer to a very large, heavy truck (also called a "juggernaut lorry"), juggernaut is more commonly used figuratively for a relentless force, entity, campaign, or movement, as in "a political/economic/cultural juggernaut."
Examples of juggernaut in a Sentence
Pj Green, Kansas City Star, 6 May 2026
Mikel Arteta and his side has a real tough task ahead of them taming this Parisian juggernaut in Budapest on May 30.
—Aleks Klosok, CNN Money, 6 May 2026
The final nail in the coffin may have been Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl, a 2012 juggernaut that primed the public for twisty, femme-centric thrillers—a hunger that still hasn’t faded.
—Hillary Busis, Vanity Fair, 4 May 2026
This Andrew Lloyd Webber juggernaut, which launched a wave of British mega-musicals in the 1980s, had a long and lucrative reign.
—Theater Critic, Los Angeles Times, 1 May 2026
See All Example Sentences for juggernaut
Cite this Entry
“Juggernaut.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/juggernaut. Accessed 11 May. 2026.
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