Definitions

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun The business of a butcher.
  • noun The act of slaughtering; the act of killing cruelly and needlessly.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb Present participle of butcher.
  • noun The act by which someone or something is butchered; a slaughter or killing.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun the business of a butcher

Etymologies

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Examples

  • Jessica and Joshua Applestone made their name butchering pasture-raised beef, pork and lamb, and teaching others the art, in their shop in Kingston, N.Y. Now they have a store in Park Slope, Brooklyn.

    NYT > Home Page By FLORENCE FABRICANT 2011

  • Unless the butchering is essential to the meaning of the story, then I usually fix it by paraphrasing.

    Misamprehension David 2006

  • Lesson completed, he'd begin butchering the deer by slicing out the entrails, along with the heart, liver, kidneys, and other organs, letting them all drop into a 25-gallon plastic "gutbucket" that he'd later haul off on his four-wheeler to a distant fenceline — a gift to the local coyotes.

    How to Cook Your Gut Pile 2004

  • He said, 'Wood, I don't like my business, but on the word of an honest man, my butchering is done as well as it can be.

    Beautiful Joe: An Autobiography 1893

  • But it was Boston mayor Thomas Menino, not known for his distinguished public speaking, who wound up stealing the show by mixing up his Boston athletes and also butchering a word.

    Boston Bruins Team Report 2010

  • And his high-priced defense team was able to convince that Galveston jury that actions that happened after the killing, namely the butchering of this man's body, were completely irrelevant to the case, were not to be considered by them in reaching their verdict of not guilty.

    CNN Transcript Dec 26, 2003 2003

  • Basye called his butchering class "an eye-opening experience," adding "it brought me back to the roots of where it starts."

    chron.com Chronicle 2010

  • All that said, here's E.O. Wilson "butchering" evolutionary theory in USA Today: "The second principle is that all life has evolved by random mutation and natural selection."

    Abiogenesis and Evolution 2008

  • All that said, here's E.O. Wilson "butchering" evolutionary theory in USA Today: "The second principle is that all life has evolved by random mutation and natural selection."

    Abiogenesis and Evolution 2008

  • Better to look at the entrails, upon 'butchering'.

    How to know which eating places to avoid 2007

  • The scam is known as “pig butchering,” for the process involved in gaining the trust of its targets, which can take weeks — fattening up the pig, so to speak — before going in for the kill.

    7 Months Inside an Online Scam Labor Camp Isabelle Qian 2023

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