exterminator

[ik-stur-muh-ney-ter]

SEE MORE SYNONYMS FOR exterminator ON THESAURUS.COM

noun

a person or thing that exterminates.

a person or business establishment specializing in the elimination of vermin, insects, etc., from a building, apartment, etc., especially by the controlled application of toxic chemicals.

Origin of exterminator

From the Late Latin word exterminātor, dating back to 1605–15. See extermine, -ator

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Related Words for exterminator

bomber, executioner, hunter, butcher, slayer, soldier, assassin, savage, cancer, radiation, vandal, firebrand, poison, iconoclast, despoiler, pillager, annihilator, chemotherapy, eradicator, wrecker

Examples from the Web for exterminator

Contemporary Examples of exterminator

Ditto the kind of people who let garbage pile up undisposed of (and don't or can't call an exterminator).
What Does it Mean to Be Poor?
Megan McArdle
September 17, 2012
And a rubbing alcohol/lavender oil mix works only as a short-term defense to buy time until the exterminator comes.
Vigilante Bedbug Exterminators
Brian Ries
August 27, 2010
An exterminator, Dill took a job in Iraq for a company contracted to do pest control on military bases.
The War's Quiet Scandal
ProPublica
February 25, 2010
Despite having the nickname “the exterminator,” DeLay did not try to exterminate wasteful spending when in power.
He's Back!
John Avlon
March 8, 2009

Historical Examples of exterminator

Cook as an exterminator of the human species seemed too glittering a novelty.
Wanted: A Cook
Alan Dale
Sometimes they are enemies who must be immolated to Mars the exterminator.
A Philosophical Dictionary, Volume 5 (of 10)
Franois-Marie Arouet (AKA Voltaire)
What would the Black Spider need to do to escape her exterminator?
More Hunting Wasps
J. Henri Fabre
Now, apparently, he was being pressed into service as an exterminator.
Student Body
Floyd L. Wallace
But neither supposition proved to be correct, for we presently picked up the “exterminator,” floating near us.
The Island Home
Richard Archer

Word Origin and History for exterminator

c.1400, "an angel who expells (people from a country)," from Late Latin exterminator, from Latin exterminatus, past participle stem of exterminare (see exterminate). As a substance for ridding a place of rats, etc., by 1848. As a person whose job it is to do this, by 1938.