- exterminate
- exterminate, extirpate, eradicate, uproot, deracinate, wipe are comparable when they mean to effect the destruction or abolition of something.Exterminate implies utter extinction; it therefore usually implies a killing off{
efforts to exterminate such pests as mosquitoes, rats, and ragweed have been only partly successful
}{the tribe had been exterminated, not here in their stronghold, but in their summer camp . . . across the river— Gather
}Extirpate implies extinction of a group, kind, or growth, but it may carry less an implication of killing off, as exterminate carries, than one of the destruction or removal of the things essential to survival and reproduction; thus, wolves might be exterminated by hunting in a particular area, but large carnivores in general are extirpated by changed conditions in thickly settled regions; a heresy is often extirpated, rather than exterminated, by the removal of the leaders from a position of influence; a vice cannot easily be extirpated so long as the conditions which promote it remain in existence{the ancient Athenians had been extirpated by repeated wars and massacres— Graves
}Eradicate stresses the driving out or elimination of something that has taken root or has established itself{diphtheria has been nearly eradicated from the United States
}{it is difficult to eradicate popular superstitions
}{he must gradually eradicate his settled conviction that the Italians and the French are wrong— Grandgent
}Uproot differs from eradicate chiefly in being more definitely figurative and in suggesting forcible and violent methods similar to those of a tempest that tears trees out by their roots{hands . . . red with guiltless blood . . . uprooting every germ of truth— Shelley
}{end forthwith the ruin of a life uprooted thus— Browning
}{refugees from the peoples uprooted by war
}Deracinate basically is very close to uproot{disemboweling mountains and deracinating pines— Stevenson
}{he fascinated the young Anderson's intellect and deracinated certain convictions— Benét
}but in much recent use it denotes specifically to separate (as oneself or one's work) from a natural or traditional racial, social, or intellectual group{although the author is himself a Negro, his book is . . . deracinated, without any of the lively qualities of the imagination peculiar to his people— Commentary
}Wipe (in this sense used with out)often implies extermination{the entire battery was wiped out by shellfire
}but it equally often suggests a canceling or obliterating (as by payment, retaliation, or exhaustion of supply){wipe out a debt
}{wipe out an old score
}{wipe out a disgrace
}{the fall in share prices wiped out his margin
}
New Dictionary of Synonyms. 2014.
