mutilate
Americanverb (used with object)
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mutilates,
present (3rd person singular)
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mutilated,
past participle, past
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mutilating
present participle
verb
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to deprive of a limb, essential part, etc; maim; dismember
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to mar, expurgate, or damage (a text, book, etc)
Synonym Usage
See maim.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
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mutilationnoun
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mutilatornoun
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self-mutilationnoun
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mutilativeadjective
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mutilatoryadjective
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self-mutilatingadjective
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unmutilatedadjective
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unmutilativeadjective
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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mutilatesimple
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mutilatessimple
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have mutilatedperfect
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has mutilatedperfect
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am mutilatingprogressive
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are mutilatingprogressive
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is mutilatingprogressive
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have been mutilatingperfect progressive
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has been mutilatingperfect progressive
Past
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mutilatedsimple
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had mutilatedperfect
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was mutilatingprogressive
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were mutilatingprogressive
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had been mutilatingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of mutilate
1525–35; from Latin mutilātus (past participle of mutilāre “to cut off, maim”), equivalent to mutil(us) “maimed, mutilated” + -ātus -ate 1
Explanation
Mutilate is a verb that means to injure or ruin, usually in a brutal or messy way. If you drop a cantaloupe into a wood chipper, you'll mutilate that poor melon, with chunks of fruit and rind flying everywhere. Mutilate can also mean altering an object so it's unrecognizable. Once you mutilate something, it'll no longer resemble its original form. Celebrities who get too much plastic surgery are said to mutilate their faces, because they no longer look like themselves. Mutilate can also describe causing a disfiguring injury. Monsters and evil villains in horror movies tend to mutilate their victims instead of neatly murdering them.
Vocabulary lists containing mutilate
"The Hunger Games" Vocabulary from Chapter 6
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Fallen Angels
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The Color of My Words
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Cassandra Pybus says there is no doubt that Crowther did mutilate Lanne, citing letters he wrote.
From BBC ● Sep. 14, 2024
“We have concluded on the basis of present evidence that Nosenko was dispatched to the West to mutilate counterintelligence leads which had been revealed by Golitsyn,” Angleton said.
From Washington Times ● Jan. 1, 2023
It would stiffen the maximum penalties for people who willfully steal, destroy, conceal, mutilate or alter such records from $1,000 and one year in prison to $10,000 and two years in prison.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 9, 2022
State law is clear: It is a felony offense for anyone to “willfully and unlawfully remove, alter, mutilate, destroy, conceal or obliterate” a public record.
From Seattle Times ● Aug. 18, 2022
I don’t know, I guess I always thought I’d turn out okay, no matter how badly my many schools tried to mutilate me.
From "A Very Large Expanse of Sea" by Tahereh Mafi
The law punishes “whoever corruptly alters, destroys, mutilates or conceals a record, document or other object … or otherwise obstructs, influences or impedes any official proceeding.”
From Washington Post ● Dec. 12, 2022
There was no camaraderie because this system mutilates your emotions - you feel nothing.
From BBC ● Sep. 27, 2017
Especially if the Common App mutilates the formatting on applicant essays and you say there’s no way to fix it.
From Slate ● Nov. 25, 2013
Editors, he predicted, would reject the concept “because it mutilates the magazine.”
From New York Times ● Oct. 1, 2010
"See that no one mutilates this body," said I, "and I'll reward you."
From Lords of the North by Agnes C. (Agnes Christina) Laut
Mr. Hemming writes that upon Miller’s death, doctors found 23 battle scars, a large wound on his right abdominal cartilage, two rifle balls lodged in his liver, and mutilated fingers on his left hand.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 17, 2026
"It is not the outsiders who have damaged Africa the most, but the mutilated will of the people and the selfishness of some of our own leaders," she wrote.
From BBC ● Jan. 6, 2025
They can cause dangerous diseases like Cryptococcus neoformans and Candida auris among our own kind, massacre beloved fellow animals like frogs and bats and even turn less-charismatic animals like cicadas into horrifyingly mutilated zombies.
From Salon ● Oct. 18, 2024
In a generation, an animal that had been despised, mutilated and shot, became revered, and ultimately protected.
From Seattle Times ● Aug. 20, 2023
Only the fingernails had color; they were metal claws the same gold as the feathers, as if some essence of the figure had pierced the mutilated flesh and burst out from the cuticles.
From "Pet" by Akwaeke Emezi
Former prime minister Boris Johnson has warned, however, against "mutilating" the project in a letter to Rishi Sunak.
From BBC ● Sep. 24, 2023
Meanwhile, humans seem to be "mutilating" the tree of life, according to some scientists, while climate change is threatening extinction.
From Salon ● Sep. 21, 2023
“Moon Knight” is not the first time that an MCU title has been called out for mutilating an Asian language.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 13, 2022
Both testicles were eventually removed – he called it “the mutilating surgery”.
From The Guardian ● Apr. 9, 2020
Four of the men went to prison for six months for knowingly destroying or mutilating their cards.
From "Boots on the Ground: America's War in Vietnam" by Elizabeth Partridge
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
