decimate English · revision 144
5 Oct 2026, 22:05 by bogdan “Add pronunciation, sense history, timeline, meanings, word family, related words” current version
Changes in this edit
@@ -1,6 +1,32 @@
+ ==Pronunciation==
+ * IPA: /ˈdɛsɪmeɪt/ ''(UK)''; /ˈdɛsəmeɪt/ ''(US)''^(Wiktionary)
+
==Etymology==
− First recorded c. 1600,^(Etymonline) or in 1591 according to Wiktionary,^(Wiktionary) in the sense “to select by lot and put to death every tenth man”.^(Etymonline) It is [[bor|la|decimātus]], past participle of [[la|decimāre|t=to punish every tenth man chosen by lot; to tithe]],^(RHWU)^(Wiktionary) [[der|la|decimus|t=tenth]], [[der|la|decem|t=ten]],^(AHD)^(RHWU) [[der|ine-pro|*dekm̥|t=ten]].^(AHD)^(Etymonline)
+ It is [[bor|la|decimātus]], past participle of [[la|decimāre|t=to punish every tenth man chosen by lot; to tithe]],^(RHWU)^(Wiktionary) [[der|la|decimus|t=tenth]], [[der|la|decem|t=ten]],^(AHD)^(RHWU) [[der|ine-pro|*dekm̥|t=ten]].^(AHD)^(Etymonline)
− The Romans sometimes inflicted this punishment on mutinous armies and rebellious cities.^(Etymonline) The looser sense “destroy a large number of” has been in use since the 1660s.^(Etymonline)
+ ==Earliest recorded meaning==
+ “To select by lot and put to death one in every ten” of a body of soldiers guilty of mutiny or another crime,^(OED 1989)^(AHD)^(Etymonline) first recorded in 1600 in John Dymmok's ''Treatise of Ireland''.^(AHD)
+
+ ==Semantic evolution==
+ The Romans sometimes inflicted this punishment on mutinous armies and rebellious cities.^(Etymonline) The looser sense “destroy a large number of” has been in use since the 1660s;^(Etymonline)^(OED 1989) Charlotte Brontë wrote in 1848 that typhus “decimated the school periodically”, though it certainly did not kill exactly a tenth.^(AHD) The OED also records the obsolete senses “to take a tenth or tithe from” (1656) and “to divide into tenths” (1749),^(OED 1989) and John Quincy Adams used it in 1821 to mean “to make decimal”.^(Etymonline)
+
+ ==Timeline==
+ * 1600 – “to execute one in ten by lot”.^(AHD)^(OED 1989)
+ * 1656 – “to take a tenth or tithe from”, now obsolete.^(OED 1989)
+ * 1660s – “to destroy a large proportion of”.^(Etymonline)^(OED 1989)
+ * 1749 – “to divide into tenths”, now obsolete.^(OED 1989)
+
+ ==Modern meaning==
+ ===Verb===
+ # To kill or destroy a large part of a group.^(AHD)^(MW Collegiate)^(RHWU)^(Wiktionary)
+ # To cause great damage to; to reduce drastically.^(AHD)^(MW Collegiate)^(Wiktionary)
+ # ''(history)'' To select by lot and kill one in every ten of.^(AHD)^(MW Collegiate)^(RHWU)^(Wiktionary)
+
+ ==Word family==
+ * [[decimation]]
+ * [[decimator]]
+
+ ==Usage notes==
+ The extension from “one in ten” to “a large proportion” is widely accepted: 66 percent of the American Heritage Usage Panel accepted it in a sentence about a population killed in war,^(AHD) but only 26 percent accepted it for destruction other than killing.^(AHD) Because some sense of “one tenth” remains, Random House advises against using ''decimate'' with exact fractions or percentages.^(RHWU) Wiktionary notes that “to devastate” has become the most common sense.^(Wiktionary)
==References==