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decimate
4 dictionary results for: decimate
Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1) - Cite This Source - Share This
dec·i·mate 
[des-uh-meyt] Pronunciation Key
—Related forms
[des-uh-meyt] Pronunciation Key –verb (used with object), -mat·ed, -mat·ing.
| 1. | to destroy a great number or proportion of: The population was decimated by a plague. |
| 2. | to select by lot and kill every tenth person of. |
| 3. | Obsolete. to take a tenth of or from. |
[Origin: 1590–1600; < L decimātus, ptp. of decimāre to punish every tenth man chosen by lot, v. deriv. of decimus tenth, deriv. of decem ten; see ate1]
] —Related forms
dec·i·ma·tion, noun
dec·i·ma·tor, noun
—Usage note The earliest English sense of decimate is “to select by lot and execute every tenth soldier of (a unit).” The extended sense “destroy a great number or proportion of” developed in the 19th century: Cholera decimated the urban population. Because the etymological sense of one-tenth remains to some extent, decimate is not ordinarily used with exact fractions or percentages: Drought has destroyed (not decimated) nearly 80 percent of the cattle.
Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1)
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006.
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006.
American Heritage Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This
| dec·i·mate
(děs'ə-māt') Pronunciation Key
tr.v. dec·i·mat·ed, dec·i·mat·ing, dec·i·mates
[Latin decimāre, decimāt-, to punish every tenth person, from decimus, tenth, from decem, ten; see dek  in Indo-European roots.]
dec'i·ma'tion n. Usage Note: Decimate originally referred to the killing of every tenth person, a punishment used in the Roman army for mutinous legions. Today this meaning is commonly extended to include the killing of any large proportion of a group. Sixty-six percent of the Usage Panel accepts this extension in the sentence The Jewish population of Germany was decimated by the war, even though it is common knowledge that the number of Jews killed was much greater than a tenth of the original population. However, when the meaning is further extended to include large-scale destruction other than killing, as in The supply of fresh produce was decimated by the nuclear accident at Chernobyl, only 26 percent of the Panel accepts the usage. |
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The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2006 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2006 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
WordNet - Cite This Source - Share This
| decimate | |
verb | |
| 1. | kill one in every ten, as of mutineers in Roman armies |
| 2. | kill in large numbers; "the plague wiped out an entire population" [syn: eliminate] |
WordNet® 3.0, © 2006 by Princeton University.
Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This
Decimate
Dec"i*mate\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Decimated; p. pr. & vb. n. Decimating.] [L. decimatus, p. p. of decimare to decimate (in senses 1 & 2), fr. decimus tenth. See Decimal.]1. To take the tenth part of; to tithe. --Johnson. 2. To select by lot and punish with death every tenth man of; as, to decimate a regiment as a punishment for mutiny. --Macaulay. 3. To destroy a considerable part of; as, to decimate an army in battle; to decimate a people by disease.
Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, © 1996, 1998 MICRA, Inc.
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