MEANING
1. To remove the internal organs from a body, especially those in the abdomen.
2. To strip a proposal, institution, or work of essential substance or effective power.
Use it for
Predation that leaves an emptied body; forensic discovery; destructive institutional critiqueFocus attention on what has been removed rather than on blood alone.
Words that belong together
- eviscerate a carcass
- eviscerated remains
- systematically eviscerate
On the page
The specimen had been eviscerated before it reached the laboratory.
Whatever hunted the cattle eviscerated them and left their hides intact.
The inquiry eviscerated the committee's authority without dissolving it.
Nearby words
Related words
Word forms
- Base
- eviscerate / eviscerates
- Past tense
- eviscerated
- Past participle
- eviscerated
- Present participle
- eviscerating
Full tense & aspect guide
- Present
- eviscerate / eviscerates
- Present continuous
- am/is/are eviscerating
- Present perfect
- have/has eviscerated
- Present perfect continuous
- have/has been eviscerating
- Past
- eviscerated
- Past continuous
- was/were eviscerating
- Past perfect
- had eviscerated
- Past perfect continuous
- had been eviscerating
- Future
- will eviscerate / eviscerates
- Future continuous
- will be eviscerating
- Future perfect
- will have eviscerated
- Future perfect continuous
- will have been eviscerating
Choose the auxiliary that agrees with your subject. These are constructions of one word, not separate entries.
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Usage notes
Primary category: horror. Clinical and graphic; more formal than disembowel. Figurative use means stripping something of its essential strength, not merely criticizing it. Verb [base, third-person present, past, past participle, -ing]: eviscerate, eviscerates, eviscerated, eviscerated, eviscerating. Derived/related family (not inflections): evisceration (noun).
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