crucify
Americanverb (used with object)
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crucifies,
present (3rd person singular)
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crucified,
past participle, past
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crucifying
present participle
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to put to death by nailing or binding the hands and feet to a cross.
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to treat with gross injustice; persecute; torment; torture.
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to subdue (passion, sin, etc.).
verb
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to put to death by crucifixion
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slang to defeat, ridicule, etc, totally
the critics crucified his performance
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to treat very cruelly; torment
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to subdue (passion, lust, etc); mortify
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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crucifysimple
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crucifiessimple
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have crucifiedperfect
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has crucifiedperfect
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am crucifyingprogressive
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are crucifyingprogressive
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is crucifyingprogressive
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have been crucifyingperfect progressive
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has been crucifyingperfect progressive
Past
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crucifiedsimple
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had crucifiedperfect
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was crucifyingprogressive
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were crucifyingprogressive
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had been crucifyingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of crucify
Middle English crucifien < Anglo-French, Old French crucifier < Latin crucifīgere, equivalent to Latin cruci- (stem of crux ) cross + fīgere to fix, bind fast
Vocabulary lists containing crucify
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:
Widower Reg Harris, 85, said giving up driving would "absolutely crucify" his lifestyle.
From BBC ● Jul. 31, 2025
She added that she felt like “everybody’s trying to crucify me” for her relationship with Combs and that she needed to “take a break and focus on what’s important” when the allegations came down.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 9, 2024
She said she’s careful about talking about her symptoms or posting online about them because “If you say one thing on social media that you got some kind of symptom they would crucify me.”
From Seattle Times ● Feb. 1, 2024
And to explain his reasoning, Biden used this phrase: “Never crucify yourself on a small cross.”
From Slate ● May 24, 2021
“He does even worse things than crucify people,” Oscar tells us one time.
From "Before We Were Free" by Julia Alvarez
I was born for the purpose that crucifies your mind,
From New York Times ● Apr. 28, 2023
James Glickson New York City It is sacrificial slaughter when society crucifies its best leaders on a cross of impossibly high standards.
From Time Magazine Archive
Who is it crucifies her love of pretty clothes, her desire for good things, her longing for pleasure that we may have all these?
From Pushing to the Front by Orison Swett Marden
I renounce once for all the alliance of public opinion, and I do not care whether it blesses or crucifies me, whether it calls me emperor or blockhead.
From Andreas Hofer by L. (Luise) Mühlbach
Plainly he had fallen into that stern Puritan mood, which not only crucifies the affections and lusts of him who harbours it, but is often a cause of disturbed digestion to his friends.
From Fragments of science, V. 1-2 by John Tyndall
Even the thief crucified alongside him, in the final minutes of his life, with nothing to offer and everything to repent, received the same promise: today you will be with me in paradise.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 29, 2026
Israeli security forces imposed restrictions on access to the Holy Sepulchre in annexed east Jerusalem, where Christians believe Jesus Christ was crucified, buried and rose from the dead.
From Barron's ● Apr. 5, 2026
“Madame Web” underperformed in the theaters because the press just crucified it.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 26, 2024
It marks the discovery of the cross Jesus was crucified on, according to Ethiopian Orthodox Christian tradition.
From BBC ● Sep. 27, 2024
Behind the college was a massive brownstone armory, and a block away, across the street, was a Catholic church with a huge cross on its lawn upon which was the crucified figure of Jesus.
From "The Chosen" by Chaim Potok
Outside the conference, protest organiser Caroline Graham told the BBC that the government's current policies were "crucifying" farmers.
From BBC ● Jan. 9, 2025
“The open/close strategy is crucifying businesses,” Michael Kill, chief executive of the Night Time Industries Association.
From Washington Times ● Dec. 21, 2021
“Instead of out-casting and almost crucifying a personality, you say: ‘Okay, this guy is different, let’s act a certain way, let’s not treat him like a Roger Federer or like a Marin Cilic.
From Washington Post ● Aug. 2, 2021
“We didn’t have some preconceived idea about crucifying Michelle,” said John Stauffer, one of the two American studies professors.
From New York Times ● Sep. 13, 2017
The letter to the editor crucifying her husband had hurt her terribly.
From "Friday Night Lights: A Town, A Team, And A Dream" by H.G. Bissinger
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.
