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In medieval and Renaissance manuscripts, a series of dots was used to mark mistakes or to label material that should be deleted from a text, and those deletion dots can help you remember the history of expunge. They were known as puncta delentia. The puncta part of the name derives from the Latin verb pungere, which can be translated as "to prick or sting" (and you can imagine that a scribe may have felt stung when their mistakes were so punctuated in a manuscript). Pungere is also an ancestor of expunge, as well as a parent of other dotted, pointed, or stinging terms such as punctuate, compunction, poignant, puncture, and pungent.
Synonyms
Examples of expunge in a Sentence
Deon J. Hampton, NBC News, 25 Feb. 2024
Nevertheless, Clinton cannot be tried again for the same crime under the Fifth Amendment, and a motion to expunge Clinton’s record was denied in February 2023.
—Chris Eberhart, Fox News, 1 Mar. 2024
Elocution lessons expunged all trace of her American accent.
—Mayukh Sen, The New Yorker, 30 Aug. 2023
The charge was subsequently reduced to a misdemeanor and expunged from his record.
—Brian Steinberg, Variety, 13 Mar. 2024
According to county data, the program has helped 2,000 people with mental illnesses or substance-use disorders get released from detention into services, and about 600 have graduated, meaning their charges have been dismissed and the cases have been expunged from their records.
—Jaclyn Cosgrove, Los Angeles Times, 22 Dec. 2023
Addressing and expunging any behaviors that signal exclusion, marginalization, incivilities based on identity and subtle acts of unkindness.
2.
—Love Odih Kumuyi, Forbes, 30 Nov. 2023
Tracy, who makes a hobby of researching dictators, deliberately expunged anything in the series that could be construed as a parallel to real-world events.
—Lili Loofbourow, Washington Post, 2 Mar. 2024
The court clerk’s office is required to enter the restriction into the Georgia Crime Information database within a month after charges are dismissed, said Brenda Smeeton, legal director at the Georgia Justice Project, which helps residents expunge their records for free.
—Deon J. Hampton, NBC News, 25 Feb. 2024
These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'expunge.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
Dictionary Entries Near expunge
Cite this Entry
“Expunge.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/expunge. Accessed 23 Apr. 2024.
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Legal Definition
expunge
transitive verb
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