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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—known as puncta delentia—can help you remember the history of expunge. Puncta comes 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.
Examples of expunge in a Sentence
Charlie Campbell, Time, 26 June 2025
Court records remain public and accessible unless otherwise sealed or expunged under separate legal authority.
—Alonzo Martinez, Forbes.com, 11 Apr. 2025
Hegseth wages anti-DEI campaign The ban on pronouns came amid Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth's sweeping push to expunge all diversity, equity and inclusion policies from the military.
—Cybele Mayes-Osterman, USA Today, 8 Apr. 2025
Air is brought in through the snorkel and expunged through a vent in the mask upon exhaling.
—Bestreviews, Mercury News, 20 May 2025
See All Example Sentences for expunge
Cite this Entry
“Expunge.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/expunge. Accessed 6 Jul. 2025.
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expunge
transitive verb
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