internecine

   For more than two hundred years writers have used internecine in the sense of a costly or self-destructive conflict, even though etymologically the word signifies only a slaughter or massacre, without any explicit sense of cost to the victor. For this small error, we can thank Samuel Johnson, who was misled by the prefix inter- and defined the word as "endeavouring mutual destruction." However, it has been misused for so long that it would be pedantic and wildly optimistic to try to enforce its original meaning. As Philip Howard has noted, "The English language cannot be regulated so as to avoid offending the susceptibilities of classical scholars." He does suggest, however, that the word should be reserved for bloody and violent disputes and not mere squabblings.