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.
time and the weather have expunged any evidence that a thriving community once existed here
Recent Examples on the WebThe school principals subsequently denied my requests to expunge my sons’ records of those suspensions – a current stain on their records.Fox News, 17 Aug. 2022 Those who cannot pay end up facing a range of penalties — including incarceration, extended probation, and the inability to expunge their records — that can keep young people entangled in the system well beyond the length of their sentences. Erica L. Green, BostonGlobe.com, 14 July 2022 Those who cannot pay end up facing a range of penalties — including incarceration, extended probation and the inability to expunge their records — that can keep young people entangled in the system well beyond the length of their sentences.New York Times, 14 July 2022 After nearly two hours of debate, the council voted 41 to 7 to approve a motion by Senate President Pro Tempore Jimmy Hickey, R-Texarkana, to expunge its June 17 approval of spending authority for the disbursal of the funds. Stephen Simpson, Arkansas Online, 22 July 2022 China’s new leader, Deng Xiaoping, did not wish to expunge Mao’s legacy. Michael Schuman, The Atlantic, 21 June 2022 Rarely do those that seek to expunge those AI biases take a much deeper look underneath to get a broader semblance of what might be happening. Lance Eliot, Forbes, 22 May 2022 The removal of statues threatens to expunge Confederate history in the South and other white historical figures elsewhere. Luke Broadwater, New York Times, 16 May 2022 This inexpensive, widespread digital access could also undermine people’s efforts to expunge their records, according to Burton. Becky Jacobs, The Salt Lake Tribune, 4 Feb. 2022 See More
Word History
Etymology
Latin expungere to mark for deletion by dots, from ex- + pungere to prick — more at pungent