Lay_waste vs Devastate - What's the difference?
lay_waste | devastate | Related terms |
To completely destroy, especially of a geographical area or region.
* 1990 , (Peter Hopkirk), The Great Game , Folio Society 2010, p. 16:
To ruin many or all things over a large area, such as most or all buildings of a city, or cities of a region, or trees of a forest.
To destroy a whole collection of related ideas, beliefs, and strongly held opinions.
To break beyond recovery or repair so that the only options are abandonment or the clearing away of useless remains (if any) and starting over.
As verbs the difference between lay_waste and devastate
is that lay_waste is to completely destroy, especially of a geographical area or region while devastate is to ruin many or all things over a large area, such as most or all buildings of a city, or cities of a region, or trees of a forest.lay_waste
English
Verb
- 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.