decimate
to drastically reduce
TRANSLATION
decimate = dezimieren, etwas stark verringern --- GOOGLE INDEX decimate: approximately 4,500,000 Google hits
STATISTICS
IN THE PRESS
The Muslim Brotherhood's more pragmatic supporters know that an outright ban on alcohol could DECIMATE Egypt's vital tourist trade, and further damage the already faltering economy.
(BBC News)
---
If GE, one of the world’s best-run companies, could be hit so hard, then economic troubles could DECIMATE corporate earnings and send a depressed stock market even lower.
(BusinessWeek magazine)
(BBC News)
---
If GE, one of the world’s best-run companies, could be hit so hard, then economic troubles could DECIMATE corporate earnings and send a depressed stock market even lower.
(BusinessWeek magazine)
Did you
know?
decimate
verb
- to kill a large number of something, or to reduce something severely
(Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary)
---
What do the words decimate and tithe have in common? The answer is the number 10, but first we need to delve into a bit of etymological history.
Tithe stems from the Old English tēotha, an adjective in the ordinal sense "tenth," used in a specialized sense as a noun. The modern sense refers to one-tenth of annual produce or earnings, which was formerly taken as a tax for the support of the Church and clergy. In certain religious denominations, a tenth of an individual’s income is pledged to the Church, which gives us the verb to "tithe."
The history of the word decimate is more complicated however. Most dictionaries accept that decimate originally referred to destroying one-tenth of something and that this alludes to the ancient Roman practice of killing one out of every ten soldiers as punishment for mutinous legions.
The Oxford English Dictionary questions whether the punishment sense of decimate is the real origin. Their research uncovered texts and dictionary entries that show decimate being used in the sense of tithing. In one 17th century dictionary there are actually two definitions: to tithe/take the tenth part and punishing every tenth man.
So it appears that at some point there were two distinct meanings. But because the root of decimate is the Latin "decimatus," which means giving one-tenth, or tithing, the experts at Oxford tend toward the tithing explanation as opposed to the more popular "killing one-tenth" theory as the "origin of the origin."
The modern sense of decimate nevertheless means to reduce or destroy something to a large extent, and not merely by one-tenth.
---
SYNONYMS
annihilate, eradicate, wipe out, decimate, eliminate, carry off, extinguish
---
SMUGGLE OWAD into today's conversation
"Fish populations in some of the world's oceans are being decimated."
verb
- to kill a large number of something, or to reduce something severely
(Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary)
---
What do the words decimate and tithe have in common? The answer is the number 10, but first we need to delve into a bit of etymological history.
Tithe stems from the Old English tēotha, an adjective in the ordinal sense "tenth," used in a specialized sense as a noun. The modern sense refers to one-tenth of annual produce or earnings, which was formerly taken as a tax for the support of the Church and clergy. In certain religious denominations, a tenth of an individual’s income is pledged to the Church, which gives us the verb to "tithe."
The history of the word decimate is more complicated however. Most dictionaries accept that decimate originally referred to destroying one-tenth of something and that this alludes to the ancient Roman practice of killing one out of every ten soldiers as punishment for mutinous legions.
The Oxford English Dictionary questions whether the punishment sense of decimate is the real origin. Their research uncovered texts and dictionary entries that show decimate being used in the sense of tithing. In one 17th century dictionary there are actually two definitions: to tithe/take the tenth part and punishing every tenth man.
So it appears that at some point there were two distinct meanings. But because the root of decimate is the Latin "decimatus," which means giving one-tenth, or tithing, the experts at Oxford tend toward the tithing explanation as opposed to the more popular "killing one-tenth" theory as the "origin of the origin."
The modern sense of decimate nevertheless means to reduce or destroy something to a large extent, and not merely by one-tenth.
---
SYNONYMS
annihilate, eradicate, wipe out, decimate, eliminate, carry off, extinguish
---
SMUGGLE OWAD into today's conversation
"Fish populations in some of the world's oceans are being decimated."
