immolate

Meanings

1. 1
   verb

   offer as a sacrifice by killing or by giving up to destruction

   The Aztecs immolated human victims

2. 2
   verb

   To kill as a sacrifice by burning.

   Evidently some, or all, of the boars immolated themselves, for the train crew are reported to have picked up three dead boars and continued to Sézanne, the next stop, where they gave them to the local hospital cooks.

3. 3
   verb

   To kill, harm, or destroy by fire.

   She imparted these stories gradually to Miss Crawley; gave her the whole benefit of them; felt it to be her bounden duty as a Christian woman and mother of a family to do so; had not the smallest remorse or compunction for the victim whom her tongue was immolating; nay, very likely thought her act was quite meritorious, and plumed herself upon her resolute manner of performing it.

The adjective is first attested in 1534, the verb in 1548; borrowed from Latin immolātus, perfect passive participle of immolō (“to sacrifice”), see -ate (verb-forming suffix) and -ate (adjective-forming suffix).

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