lacerate

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English laceraten,^[2][3][4] borrowed from Latin lacerātus (“torn”), the past participle of lacerō (“to tear to pieces, mangle”),^{[5][3][4][6][7]} from lacer (“mangled, torn”).^[5][8][9][7] Merriam-Webster Unabridged calls that last step probable,^[6] and Barnhart considers the Latin adjective of uncertain origin.^[3] The OED traces it to the same Indo-European base as Ancient Greek λακίς (lakís, “rent, tear”),^[5][7] and Etymonline, after Watkins, reconstructs Proto-Indo-European *lēk- (“to rend, tear”), also the source of lacinia (“flap of a garment”) and lancinō (“to pierce, stab”).^[4] The OED compares Middle French lacerer, recorded from about 1355, earliest in a figurative use.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

To rend or pull apart: about 1425, in a translation of Guy de Chauliac's Grande Chirurgie, where the translator glosses the new word with a native one: "lacerate not, i. ryue not, þe punctez".^[2][5][3] Etymonline likewise dates the verb to the early 15th century,^[4] while Hoad, Collins and Dictionary.com date it to the 16th century.^[10][11][12]

Semantic evolution

The Latin verb already covered both torn flesh and mental anguish or verbal attack.^[5][4] English took the physical sense first and added the figurative "to afflict, distress" in 1600 by the OED's evidence,^[5] the 1640s by Etymonline's.^[4] Johnson (1755) gave only the physical sense, "to tear; to rend; to separate by violence", though his quotation from Howell applies it to sons who rip up the womb that bore them.^[13] The adjective, from the same Latin participle, meant simply "torn" from 1514,^[5] a use now archaic and rare;^[5] since 1776 it has survived as a term of botany for a jagged margin.^[5][14]

Timeline

• c. 1425 – verb, to tear apart, in a surgical text.^[2][5] Merriam-Webster Unabridged dates this sense to the 15th century.^[6]
• 1514 – adjective, torn, ripped apart.^[5] Merriam-Webster Unabridged dates the adjective to 1542.^[6]
• 1597 – the noun laceration.^[3]
• 1600 – verb, figurative, to afflict, distress, harrow.^[5]
• 1776 – adjective, in botany, having an irregularly cleft margin.^[5]

Meanings

Verb

1. To tear or cut flesh roughly, leaving a jagged wound: Broken glass lacerated the climber's palm.^[11][6][5]
2. To cause deep distress to; to harrow the feelings: The letter lacerated his pride.^[11][5]

Adjective

1. (botany) Having a jagged edge, as if torn: a lacerate petal.^[11][5][14]
2. (archaic) Torn, mangled.^[5][14]

Word family

• lacerative
• lacerable
• laceration

Related words

• lancinate

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
3. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b c d e Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
7. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
8. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
9. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
11. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
12. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
13. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
14. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press