assassinated

adjectiveB2Common in everyday speech and writing · #5,329 of 15,258leans written

Assassinated means murdered by surprise attack for political reasons. An assassinated leader.

The political motive is what makes it assassination rather than murder. Somebody assassinated is nearly always famous, since the word implies the killing was meant to change something.

Definitions of assassinated

1adjectiveassassinatedMurdered by surprise attack for political reasons.B2
“Two of the assassinated men had been warned that week.”

assassinated is a state.

Where it comes from

Middle French
assassiner
English
assassinate
English, today
assassinated

assassinate comes from assassin + -ate, after Middle French assassiner.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practise this word

assassinated in the wild

On 20 September 2011, Rabbani was assassinated by a suicide bomber entering his home in Kabul.
Burhanuddin Rabbani
While campaigning for the elections, he was assassinated by a suicide bomber from the LTTE.
Rajiv Gandhi
Rabin was the first native-born prime minister of Israel, the only prime minister to be assassinated, and the second to die in office after Levi Eshkol.
Yitzhak Rabin
In 2001, he was assassinated by one of his bodyguards, and was succeeded by his 29-year-old son Joseph.
Laurent-Désiré Kabila
Neave was assassinated in a car bomb attack at the House of Commons; the Irish National Liberation Army claimed responsibility.
Airey Neave

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From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

Related words

the assassiner family

assassination assassinated assassinate

assassinated — used about once every 1,358 pages · #5,329 · point at the bar for the others

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