Wiktionary
n. (context idiomatic English) A scheme or instrument for causing death or harm, especially one which eventually brings about the downfall of its creator; something which is initially regarded as advantageous but which is later recognized to be disadvantageous or harmful.
Usage examples of "poisoned chalice".
Or had they holh drunk too deeply from the poisoned chalice that was the Madness Maze?
If I'd surrendered to the appropriate human responses-blind panic and awe-struck humility-in the face of the magnitude of everything which supposedly lay in the balance, I would have thrown the poisoned chalice of the notepad away.
The whole affair was a poisoned chalice, and if he wasn't removed by the regional SpecOps commander, Goliath would as likely as not do the job themselves.
Kay Scarpetta, Chief, Medical Examiner on a similar case in Virginia, is called in to apply her forensic skills to this latest atrocity, but the } apparent simplicity of the case proves something of a poisoned chalice until Scarpetta finds enlightenment through the curious pathologists' playground known as the Body Farm.
The simple but malevolent idea was that father and son would take a drink from alternate glasses, until one of them stumbled upon the poisoned chalice.
He hadn't so much been handed the poisoned chalice as wrestled it out of everyone else's hands.
But he was old enough and wise enough to know that the fledgling heirs to wealth, power and privilege often found themselves holding a poisoned chalice.