pandemonium
pan-duh-MOH-nee-umnounMeaning wild noise and confusion
Memory hook PAN-DEMO-nium: ALL the PANS banging. A mouse dashes across the kitchen; the cat leaps, every pan clatters to the floor, and everyone shrieks at once. The kitchen is pandemonium.
When the mouse ran across the cafeteria, pandemonium broke out.
In context The quiet library turned to pandemonium when the alarm went off: chairs scraped, books tumbled and everyone rushed for the doors at once.
Similar chaos, uproar, bedlam, turmoil
Opposite calm, order, peace
Coined in 1667 by the poet John Milton as the name of the demons’ capital in his long poem: pan- (all) + Late Latin daemonium (evil spirit). The sense “wild uproar” came later.