CACOPHONY (SAT)

n. A disagreeable, harsh, or discordant sound or combination of sounds or tones.

"The brass band played too loudly and out of tune. They raised such a cacophony that I thought I would go deaf."

"The brass band played too loudly and out of tune. They raised such a terrible noise that I thought I would go deaf."

"The brass band played too loudly and out of tune. It was cacophonous."

This word has two roots from Greek that are important and found in other words. The root "caco-" means "bad." The other part of the word "phon" means sound (like telephone). The antonym (opposite) of cacophony, "euphony," means "soothing, pleasant sound." Here we see the root "phon" ("sound") and the prefix "eu," which means "good." (as in eulogy, "good speech" or the name Eugene "well born").

Now this brings us to another interesting distinction. Does this mean that the word "phony" has something to do with sound? Not necessarily. According to The Free Dictionary the word "phony" comes from the Old Irish word fainne (fawney), which is a gilt brass ring used by swindlers. Its easy to confuse the meaning of words by assuming that words that have similar sounding roots have the same root meaning. Watch out for this! Otherwise you might not understand what someone means when they tell you that Eugene's cacophonous eulogy was just too phony to be euphonious!

Thinkmap Visual Thesaurus: cacophony