Word Pronunciation & Dictionary

lay waste

Word Rarity Uncommon

Frequency: Zipf frequency 4.41 in modern English

Syllables: lay waste
IPA

14

Scrabble Score

8

Letters

1

Syllables

7

Unique Chars

Meaning

verb

To completely destroy, especially of a geographical area or region.

Transitive verb

verb

simple past of lie waste

Example Sentences

"When she recovered from a bad illness that she had, she laid the whole place waste, as you have seen it, and she has never since looked upon the light of day."
"Thirsting for revenge, his troops stormed the fortress of Kazan on the upper Volga in 1553, slaughtering the defenders just as the Mongols had done when they laid waste Russia's great cities."
"In addition to racking up what looks like a substantial offscreen body count, the movie at one point offers an eight-second introduction for a sleazy used-car salesman character for the sole purpose of justifying Tripp and Creech laying waste to his inventory."

Usage

Transitive verb

Inflected Forms

lays waste (present, singular) laying waste (participle, present) laid waste (participle, past) laid waste (past)

Synonyms

devastate ravage destroy annihilate aerosolize atomize benothing bewreck blot out blotto dash decompose

Questions

What does lay waste mean?: To completely destroy, especially of a geographical area or region.

How to pronounce lay waste

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