exterminate
pronunciation
How to pronounce exterminate in British English:
UK [ɪkˈstɜːmɪneɪt]
How to pronounce exterminate in American English:
US [ɪkˈstɜːrmɪneɪt]
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- Verb:
- kill en masse; kill on a large scale; kill many
- destroy completely, as if down to the roots
Word Origin
- exterminate (v.)
- 1540s, "drive away," from Latin exterminatus, past participle of exterminare "drive out, expel, put aside, drive beyond boundaries," also, in Late Latin "destroy," from phrase ex termine "beyond the boundary," from ex- "out of" (see ex-) + termine, ablative of termen "boundary, limit, end" (see terminus). Meaning "destroy utterly" is from 1640s in English, a sense found in equivalent words in French and in the Vulgate; earlier in this sense was extermine (mid-15c.). Related: Exterminated; exterminating.
Example
- 1. As a human being , you need to be craftier than cockroaches and use an assortment of ways to exterminate them .
- 2. Modern weapons make it practically certain that the next serious war will exterminate the human race .
- 3. In 1987 , at age 13 , john fled his home in southern sudan narrowly escaping troops sent to exterminate all black christian males .
- 4. As beijing itself learned in the recent past , she argues , cities that try to exterminate cats often just find that a new cat colony eventually moves into an area where an old one had been taken away .
- 5. Mr. burleigh shows that nazi leaders and many germans saw the war serving the " ultimate good " of the progress of the german race , which had the right and indeed the duty to propagate itself and enslave and exterminate others .