decimate
verb /ˈdesɪmeɪt/
/ˈdesɪmeɪt/
Verb Forms
| present simple I / you / we / they decimate | /ˈdesɪmeɪt/ /ˈdesɪmeɪt/ |
| he / she / it decimates | /ˈdesɪmeɪts/ /ˈdesɪmeɪts/ |
| past simple decimated | /ˈdesɪmeɪtɪd/ /ˈdesɪmeɪtɪd/ |
| past participle decimated | /ˈdesɪmeɪtɪd/ /ˈdesɪmeɪtɪd/ |
| -ing form decimating | /ˈdesɪmeɪtɪŋ/ /ˈdesɪmeɪtɪŋ/ |
- [usually passive] to kill large numbers of animals, plants or people in a particular area
- be decimated (by something) The rabbit population was decimated by the disease.
- decimate something (informal) to severely damage something or make something weaker
- Cheap imports decimated the British cycle industry.
Word Originlate Middle English: from Latin decimat- ‘taken as a tenth’, from the verb decimare, from decimus ‘tenth’. In Middle English the term decimation denoted the levying of a tithe, and later the tax imposed by the English statesman Cromwell on the Royalists (1655).