obliterated

American  

[uh-blit-uh-rey-tid] / əˈblɪt əˌreɪ tɪd /

adjective

1. completely destroyed or done away with, so that little or no trace remains.

   I stood amid the rubble of obliterated buildings, where not even a feral cat was to be seen.

   Removing the brain tumor left him with an obliterated memory of the last 15 years.

2. blotted out completely so that it cannot be read or discerned.

   He was arrested for possession of a firearm with an obliterated serial number.

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verb

1. the simple past tense and past participle of obliterate.

Other Word Forms

• half-obliterated adjective
• unobliterated adjective

Etymology

Origin of obliterated

First recorded in 1605–15; obliterate ( def. ) + -ed ² ( def. ) for the adjective senses; obliterate ( def. ) + -ed ¹ ( def. ) for the verb sense

Example Sentences

During a 1987 trip back to Poland, he found that the cemetery where his grandparents were buried had been obliterated by a highway.

From The Wall Street Journal

With the Lake Avenue property obliterated, it now operates out of Pasadena’s McKinley School.

From Los Angeles Times

Islamic State emerged in Syria and Iraq in 2014 where it quickly seized control of vast areasbefore being almost completely obliterated five years later in a U.S.-backed counterterrorism operation.

From The Wall Street Journal

"It was a crazy game. The defences have been obliterated. It was absolute madness."

From BBC

The explosion obliterated a coral island in Bikini Atoll, sucking millions of tons of coral dust into the sky.

From Literature