English → Latin
“erase” in Latin
exstinguōto quench, extinguish, put out; to destroy, kill, slay, abolishdēleōto destroy, raze, annihilate; to finish, terminate, put an end to; to delete (e.g. Ecclesiastical: from the book of lifeindūcōto lead, bring or conduct in or into somewhere; to bring forward, exhibit, represent; to bring into or before a courtcorrigōto correct (set right); to straighten; to make alterations or improvements in, amend, reforminterlinōto daub, besmear or anoint between; to falsify by erasingexpungōto strike out, cross out, blot out, erase; to expunge (a debt)rādōto scrape, shave, scratch; to rub, smooth; to touch (upon), brush along, grazeērādōto scrape away, pare; to abolish, eradicate, remove; to erase, deleteexsculpōto dig out or carve out; to elicit or extort; to erase
The English word erase itself goes back to Latin rādō, through ērāsus.
Riddle & Arnold A Copious and Critical English–Latin Lexicon, 1864
erase
exstinguere: delere: inducere (inducere, especially of erasing whole passages with the inverted stylus): litura tollere or corrigere (to correct a mistake, mendum scripturae, with the stylus): interlinere (to erase with a line through the word, etc., to be altered): expungere (erase with dots): radere, eradere (by erasure): exsculpere (with the graving-tool). He completely erased what he had written, quae scripserat, ea plane exstinxit (Cic.).
IMPROPR., exstinguere: delere.
Quick answer
- What is the Latin word for erase?
- The usual Latin words for “erase” are exstinguō, dēleō, indūcō; also corrigō, interlinō, expungō. The right choice depends on the sense; see the distinctions below.
Entry from J. E. Riddle & T. K. Arnold, A Copious and Critical English–Latin Lexicon (rev. C. Anthon, New York: Harper, 1864), digitised by Fergus J. P. Walsh, CC BY-SA 4.0; Latin markup adapted by latindictionary.co.