snake pit

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snake pit

n. Slang

1. A place full of disorder, lawlessness, and often malice.

2. A mental hospital, especially one that is overcrowded and chaotic.

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

snake′ pit`

or snake′pit`,

1. a mental hospital marked by squalor and inhumane or indifferent care for the patients.

2. an intensely chaotic or disagreeable place or situation.

[after a novel with the same title (1946) by Mary Jane Ward (b. 1905), U.S. novelist]

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Noun	1.	snake pit - any place of pain and turmoil; "the hell of battle"; "the inferno of the engine room"; "when you're alone Christmas is the pits"; hell, hell on earth, hellhole, inferno, the pits region, part - the extended spatial location of something; "the farming regions of France"; "religions in all parts of the world"; "regions of outer space"
	2.	snake pit - pejorative terms for an insane asylum booby hatch, crazy house, cuckoo's nest, funny farm, funny house, loony bin, madhouse, nut house, nuthouse, sanatorium, Bedlam mental home, mental hospital, mental institution, psychiatric hospital, insane asylum, asylum, institution - a hospital for mentally incompetent or unbalanced person

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