putsch

/pʊtʃ/

Other forms: putsches

When a group rises up and overthrows a government, it is sometimes called a putsch, or — more commonly — a coup.

This word shares a pronunciation with an informal term for dog, pooch, but there the similarity ends. A putsch is a quick and dirty overthrow of a government; it tends to be used most often for places that experience a lot of these. Putsch comes from the Swiss German word of the same spelling, which means "revolt," or "a sudden blow or push." Another word for a putsch is a coup d'état.

Definitions of putsch

1. noun

   a sudden and decisive change of government illegally or by force
   synonyms: coup, coup d'etat, takeover

   examples:

   October Revolution

   the coup d'etat by the Bolsheviks under Lenin in November 1917 that led to a period of civil war which ended in victory for the Bolsheviks in 1922

   types:

   countercoup

   a sudden and decisive overthrow of a government that gained power by a coup d'etat

   type of:

   group action

   action taken by a group of people