obliterate

obliterate

English

Etymology

Learned borrowing from Latin oblitterātus, perfect passive participle of oblitterō (“blot out”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /əbˈlɪtəɹeɪt/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

Verb

obliterate (third-person singular simple present obliterates, present participle obliterating, simple past and past participle obliterated)

1. To remove completely, leaving no trace; to wipe out; to destroy.

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:destroy

   • 1876, William Black, Madcap Violet:

     The harsh and bitter feelings of this or that experience are slowly obliterated.

   • 1907 August, Robert W[illiam] Chambers, chapter VIII, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, OCLC 24962326:

     Elbows almost touching they leaned at ease, idly reading the almost obliterated lines engraved there. ¶ "I never understood it," she observed, lightly scornful. "What occult meaning has a sun-dial for the spooney? I'm sure I don't want to read riddles in a strange gentleman's optics."

   • 2022 January 12, Benedict le Vay, “The heroes of Soham...”, in RAIL, number 948, page 43:

     Soham's station had been completely obliterated (the replacement was to close in 1965 and is only now being reopened).

Related terms

• obliteration

Translations

to remove completely, leaving no trace; to wipe out; to destroy

Albanian: please add this translation if you can Armenian: please add this translation if you can Belarusian: знішчыць pf (zniščycʹ), знішчаць impf (zniščacʹ), вынішчыць pf (vyniščycʹ), вынішчаць impf (vyniščacʹ) Bulgarian: изличавам (bg) (izličavam), унищожавам (bg) (uništožavam) Catalan: anihilar (ca), aniquilar (ca), esmicolar (ca), destrossar (ca), destruir (ca) Danish: udslette, tilintetgøre (da) Dutch: uitwissen (nl) Esperanto: please add this translation if you can Estonian: please add this translation if you can Finnish: tuhota (fi), hävittää (fi) French: annihiler (fr), effacer (fr) Georgian: please add this translation if you can German: auslöschen (de), verwischen (de) Hungarian: eltöröl (hu), kiirt (hu) Italian: obliterare (it), annullare (it), spazzare (it) Latin: oblitterō, annihilō (la) Latvian: please add this translation if you can Lithuanian: please add this translation if you can Maori: urupatu Norwegian: Bokmål: utslette Nynorsk: utslette, utsletta Polish: wyniszczać (pl) impf, wyniszczyć (pl) pf Portuguese: aniquilar (pt), obliterar (pt) Romanian: please add this translation if you can Russian: уничто́жить (ru) pf (uničtóžitʹ) Spanish: remover (es), borrar (es), destruir (es), obliterar (es), arrasar (es), aniquilar (es) Swedish: utplåna (sv) Turkish: please add this translation if you can Ukrainian: please add this translation if you can

Further reading

• “obliterate”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.

---

Italian

Verb

obliterate

1. inflection of obliterare:
   1. second-person plural present indicative
   2. second-person plural imperative

Participle

obliterate f pl

1. feminine plural of obliterato

---

Latin

Verb

obliterāte

1. second-person plural present active imperative of obliterō