demolish

English

Etymology

Attested since the 16th Century CE; from Middle French demoliss-, the stem of some conjugated forms of the verb demolir (“to destroy”, “to tear down”), from Latin demolior (“to tear down”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA: /dəˈmɒl.ɪʃ/, SAMPA: /d@"mQl.IS/

• Audio (US)

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Verb

demolish (third-person singular simple present demolishes, present participle demolishing, simple past and past participle demolished)

1. To destroy; to destruct

   They demolished the old house and put up four townhouses.

2. (transitive) To utterly defeat
   • 2011 October 2, Kevin Core, “Fulham 6 - 0 QPR”, BBC Sport:

     Andrew Johnson scored a hat-trick as Fulham demolished London rivals Queens Park Rangers to win their Premier League fixture of the season.

Synonyms

• See also Wikisaurus:destroy

Translations

to destroy

Albanian: dërmoj (sq), prish (sq) Bulgarian: събарям (bg), разрушавам (bg) Czech: bourat (cs) Dutch: slopen (nl) Estonian: lammutama (et) Finnish: tuhota (fi), hajottaa (fi) French: démolir (fr) German: abreißen (de), niederreißen (de) Hebrew: הרס (he) (harás) Hungarian: bont (hu), ledönt Indonesian: hancur lebur (id)

Italian: demolire (it) Kurdish: Sorani: ڕوخاندن (ku) (RookhAndin) Latin: dēmōlior (la) Romanian: dărâma (ro) Russian: разрушать (ru) (razrušát’) impf., разрушить (ru) (razrúšit’) pf., (of old buildings) сносить (ru) (snosít’) impf., снести (ru) (snestí) pf. Scottish Gaelic: di-làraich (gd) Spanish: demoler (es) Turkish: yikmak (tr)

References

• “demolish” in the Online Etymology Dictionary, Douglas Harper, 2001