eradicate
pronunciation
How to pronounce eradicate in British English:
UK [ɪˈrædɪkeɪt]
How to pronounce eradicate in American English:
US [ɪˈrædɪkeɪt]
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- Verb:
- kill in large numbers
- destroy completely, as if down to the roots
Word Origin
- eradicate
- eradicate: [16] Semantically, eradicate is an analogous formation to uproot. It comes from the past participle of Latin ērādicāre ‘pull out by the roots’, a compound verb formed from the prefix ex- ‘out’ and rādix ‘root’ (source of English radical and radish and related to English root). In the 16th and 17th centuries it was often used literally (‘oaks eradicated by a prodigious whirlwind’, Thomas Nabbes, Hannibal and Scipio 1637), but since then the metaphorical ‘remove totally’ has taken over.=> radish, root
- eradicate (v.)
- early 15c., "destroy utterly," literally "pull up by the roots," from Latin eradicatus, past participle of eradicare "to root out, annihilate" (see eradication). Related: Eradicated; eradicating; eradicable.
Example
- 1. No amount of washing can then eradicate the bugs completely .
- 2. Efforts to eradicate the disease languished for years until recently .
- 3. None of this will eradicate crime , espionage or wars in cyberspace .
- 4. Even taking off ten pounds can eradicate snoring , experts say .
- 5. The milestone is a major victory in the global effort to eradicate polio .