Obliterate

/əˈblɪtəɹeɪt/ · verb

Meaning

To destroy (someone or something) completely, leaving no trace; to annihilate, to wipe out..

Definitions by Sense

1. To destroy (someone or something) completely, leaving no trace; to annihilate, to wipe out.
2. To hide (something) by covering it; to conceal, to obscure.
3. To make (a drawing, text which is printed or written, etc.) indecipherable, either by erasing or obscuring it; to blot out, to efface, to delete.
4. To impair the function and/or structure of (a body cavity, vessel, etc.) by ablating or occluding it (in the latter case, chiefly by filling it with tissue).
5. To cancel (a postage stamp) with a postmark so it cannot be reused.
6. To be destroyed completely, leaving no trace.
7. Of a body cavity, vessel, etc.: to close up or fill with tissue; of perfusion or a pulse: to cease owing to obstruction.
8. (except poetic) Completely destroyed or erased; effaced, obliterated.

Example Sentences

[H]e [Pope Gregory I] deſigned to obliterate and extinguiſh the memorie of Heathen antiquitie and Authors.

This opinion ſeemeth to me, to leave very little or no place for the Chriſtian Religion. For […] It obliterateth the notion of Gods Holineſs, vvhich to be no Holineſs, but a common or indifferent thing.

VVhen vve forget Things; either the Impreſſions are obliterated, or the Images diſſolved into their firſt Principles, or Exterminated from the Brain, vvith the Current of the Animal Spirits into the Nerves.

All tenderness for the feelings of others, all selfrespect, all sense of the becoming, were obliterated from his [George Jeffreys, 1st Baron Jeffreys's] mind.

The Four Years' War is over— […] A new race, a young and lusty generation, already sweeps in with oceanic currents, obliterating the war, and all its scars, its mounded graves, and all its reminiscences of hatred, conflict, death. So let it be obliterated.

That is what distance does for us; the harsh and bitter feelings of this or that experience are slowly obliterated, and memory begins to look kindly on the past.

The seal of Pepi is in the House of Rurutȧ. The god who obliterateth sin, Ȧṭer-ȧsfet, obliterateth the transgressions which belong to Pepi in the presence of Khenti-merti in Sekhem.

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

Synonyms for obliterate

Antonyms for obliterate

Related Words

Word Forms

• obliterates
• obliterating
• obliterated
• no-table-tags
• glossary
• obliterate
• obliteratest
• obliteratedst
• obliterateth
• -
• more obliterate
• most obliterate

Usage Notes

Choose a synonym only when it preserves the intended meaning, tone, and grammar of the full sentence.

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