Definition of "butchery"

butchery¹

noun
countable and uncountable, plural butcheries
1. The cruel, ruthless killings of humans, as at a slaughterhouse.
  Quotations
  The tyrannous and bloody act is done,—The most arch deed of piteous massacreThat ever yet this land was guilty of.Dighton and Forrest, who I did subornTo do this piece of ruthless butchery
  c. 1593 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedy of Richard the Third: […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act IV, scene iii]
2. (rare) An abattoir, a slaughterhouse.
3. The butchering of meat.
  Quotations
  This butchery begins in the first Japanese month. For this purpose they put the animal's head between two long poles, which are squeezed together by fifty or sixty people, both men and women. When the bear is dead they eat his flesh, keep the liver as a medicine
  1922, James Frazer, “Chapter 52”, in The Golden Bough
4. A disastrous effort, an atrocious failure.
5. A meat market

butchery²

noun
countable and uncountable, plural butcheries
1. (slang) The stereotypical behaviors and accoutrements of being a butch lesbian.