bite the dust

Cultural  

1. Literally, to fall face down in the dirt; to suffer a defeat: “Once again, the champion wins, and another contender bites the dust.”

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bite the dust Idioms  

1. Suffer defeat or death, as in The 1990 election saw both of our senators bite the dust. Although this expression was popularized by American Western films of the 1930s, in which either cowboys or Indians were thrown from their horses to the dusty ground, it originated much earlier. Tobias Smollett had it in Gil Blas (1750): “We made two of them bite the dust.”

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Example Sentences

See Examples For:

bite the dust

The fervor goes beyond the historic rivalry between Pele's Brazil and Diego Maradona's Argentina: Mexico, Colombia, Chile and others are all hoping Lionel Messi's Albiceleste bite the dust on Sunday.

From Barron's ● Jul. 18, 2026

Citing inflationary pressures and slumping enrollment, Cazenovia College in central New York will close at the end of the school year, making it among the latest to bite the dust.

From Washington Times ● Apr. 5, 2023

Seeing that and other jobs bite the dust was "so disappointing", she says.

From BBC ● Mar. 7, 2021

Should City’s woes continue, or put another way should Guardiola persist in playing a high defensive line with Nicolás Otamendi at the heart of it, another pre-season theory will soon bite the dust.

From The Guardian ● Oct. 14, 2019

The noble Army of Northern Virginia, once, twice conqueror of empire, must bite the dust before its formidable adversary.

From From Manassas to Appomattox Memoirs of The Civil War in America by James Longstreet