*SET-U

PERMANENT JOURNEY RECORD / 115

COMPLETE ROUTE ↗
STAGE 04broadNO SINGLE PIN

17th c. onward

English-language decimate senses

decimate DOSSIER ↗
THE REVIEWED ROUTE CLAIM

The drastic-reduction and severe-destruction senses are not a recent mistake: Merriam-Webster reports that the broader meaning arose within a few decades and has been used steadily since the seventeenth century.

COORDINATES STORED
NO
HONEST TO PLOT
NO
PLACEMENT MODE
broad
TIME PRECISION
open
NUMERIC TIME BOUND
YES
CLAIM CITATIONS
2
THE TEMPORAL CLAIM

THIS STAGE ENTERS THE TIMELINE.

The open interval begins at the start of the source-reported seventeenth-century horizon. It is a conservative century boundary, not an invented exact broadening year.

PLACE IN GLOBAL CHRONOLOGY ↗
DIRECT STAGE-LEVEL PROVENANCE

AUDIT THE ROUTE CLAIM.

Every source below identifies its exact stance, locator, and evidentiary contribution.

  1. supports

    Decimate — Word History

    Reports that the broader severe-damage or destruction meaning arose within a few decades and has been used steadily since the seventeenth century; current definitions preserve it.

    Did You Know?; definitions 3a–bAUDIT SOURCE ↗
  2. context

    The Original Definition of Decimate

    Explains why restricting present-day decimate to its Roman every-tenth history is an etymological fallacy and documents early English sense expansion.

    Discussion of semantic change and multiple meaningsAUDIT SOURCE ↗