Why “historicide” is a great word
HISTORICIDE — [Noun] The deliberate erasure or destruction of historical memory, records, or identity. From history (from Latin historia, "narrative of past events") + -cide (from Latin -cidium, "killing, slaying"). Unlike genocide, which targets the physical annihilation of a people, or revisionism, which implies a contentious reinterpretation, historicide is the targeted murder of the past itself. It is the archive set ablaze, the monument ground to dust, and the grandfather who falls silent because the language of his childhood is forbidden—a quiet violence against time that leaves a people weightless, adrift in a present without origin or lament.