Dalek.
A member of a species of extraterrestrial cyborg mutants who appear in the television programme Doctor Who and are known for travelling in metallic shells, having monotone, mechanically distorted voices, repeating a limited number of phrases, and their fanatical obsession with exterminating other, non-Dalek beings.
Meaning & usage
A member of a species of extraterrestrial cyborg mutants who appear in the television programme Doctor Who and are known for travelling in metallic shells, having monotone, mechanically distorted voices, repeating a limited number of phrases, and their fanatical obsession with exterminating other, non-Dalek beings.
One who is dogmatic, unfeeling and determined.
Where this word comes from
Coined by Terry Nation in 1963 for his script of The Mutants (later retitled "The Daleks"), the second serial of the first season of Doctor Who. Accounts of how he devised the word vary. Within the Doctor Who universe, the word is supposed to be related to the name of the people from whom the Daleks evolved, either the Kaleds (as according to later serial Genesis of the Daleks) or the Dals (as in The Daleks), or to derive from a word meaning "gods" in their (fictional) language, in which the sacred "Book of Predictions" is written. According to the I, Davros audio fiction the book reads "...and on that day, men will become as gods", with the last word pronounced "Dal-eks".
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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.
Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.