denude

See also: dénude and dénudé

English

WOTD – 7 March 2016

Etymology

From Middle French dénuder, from Latin dēnūdāre, from dē- + nūdus (“bare”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /dɪˈnjuːd/
• Hyphenation: de‧nude
• Rhymes: -uːd

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

Verb

denude (third-person singular simple present denudes, present participle denuding, simple past and past participle denuded)

1. To divest of all covering; to make bare or naked; to strip.

   He denuded himself of his clothes.

   Widespread deforestation has led to lands being denuded.

   • 1849, Herman Melville, Mardi: And a Voyage Thither. […], volume (please specify |volume=I or II), New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], →OCLC:

     But King Piko had been long harassed with the thought, that the unobstructed and indefinite increase of his browsing subjects might eventually denude of herbage his portion of the island.

   • 1898, Arnold Henry Savage Landor, In the Forbidden Land:

     They not only visit adultery on the guilty man himself by beating him, but the men proceed en masse to the house of his parents and denude it of all furniture, stores of grain, and merchandise.

2. To remove (something or someone) of their possessions or assets.

   Their property was seized, denuded and confiscated.

   The service was denuded of its capacity to deliver.

   • 1886, A. Mary F. Robinson, Margaret of Angoulême, Queen of Navarre:

     And Louisa, a niece of Pierre, claimed his inheritance on the death of Suzanne. Thus, in her cruel anger, she hoped to denude the Constable of the whole of the heritage of his dead wife.

3. (geology) To strip (a mountain, volcano, or other geological formation) by erosion of outer layers so as to lay bare the inner structure.
   • 1903, John W. Judd, Volcanoes: What they are and what they teach, page 275:

     The well-known hill of Arthur’s Seat, which overlooks the city of Edinburgh, and many castle-crowned crags of the Forth and Clyde valleys, are the worn and denuded relics of these small volcanoes.

Derived terms

• denudement
• denuder

Related terms

• denudation
• denudatory

Translations

divest of all covering

• Bulgarian: оголвам (bg) (ogolvam)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 剥光, 剥夺 (zh) (bōduó)

• Czech: obnažit pf, zbavit porostu
• Greek:

  Ancient Greek: γυμνόω (gumnóō)

• Norwegian: (figurative) avkle, (literal) kle av
• Polish: obnażać (pl) impf, obnażyć (pl) pf
• Russian: обнажать (ru) (obnažatʹ), лиша́ть (ru) (lišátʹ)
• Spanish: desnudar (es)
• Turkish: çıplaklaştırmak (tr)

remove of possessions

• Czech: zbavit (cs) pf, odebrat (cs) pf

See also

• disrobe
• uncover

Anagrams

• Dundee, dudeen, duende, endued

Spanish

Verb

denude

1. inflection of denudar:
   1. first/third-person singular present subjunctive
   2. third-person singular imperative