extermination

extermination means the act of exterminating; total destruction or eradication.

Why “extermination” is a great word

Extermination is the act of causing complete and utter destruction or annihilation of a living group or entity. From Middle French extermination, a learned borrowing from Ecclesiastical Latin exterminātiō, from extermināre ("to drive out, banish, destroy"). Unlike genocide, which carries the grievous specificity of targeting a people, or eradication, which suggests the clinical removal of a pestilence, extermination is the blunter instrument, a final solution applied to any breathing multitude deemed wholly undesirable. It is the colony of ants dissolved in chemical fog, the last wolf falling to a rifle’s crack, and the relentless sweep of a scythe through a field of grass—a silence left behind that is not peace, but vacancy.

Etymology

Borrowed from Middle French extermination, itself a learned borrowing from Ecclesiastical Latin exterminātiō.

noun

The act of exterminating; total destruction or eradication.e.g.“extermination of error or vice”
Elimination.

Words closest in meaning

By meaning, not spelling — each word's AI semantic fingerprint, nearest first.

eradication 90% match — The act of plucking up by the roots; an uprooting or rooting out; extirpation; utter destruction. vs extermination →
speciecide 89% match — The systematic extermination of a species. vs extermination →
specicide 89% match — The elimination of an entire species. vs extermination →
annihilate 88% match — To reduce to nothing, to destroy, to eradicate. vs extermination →
genocide 88% match — The systematic and deliberate destruction of a group of people; typically by killing substantial numbers of them, on the basis of their ethnicity, religion, nationality, or similar grounds. vs extermination →
depopulation 88% match — The act of depopulating or condition of being depopulated; the destruction or expulsion of inhabitants. vs extermination →
exterminationist 88% match — A supporter of exterminationism. vs extermination →
xenocide 87% match — The killing of a stranger or foreigner. vs extermination →