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Origin and history of liquidate

liquidate(v.)

1570s, of accounts, "to reduce to order, to set out clearly" (a sense now obsolete), from Late Latin or Medieval Latin liquidatus, past participle of liquidare "to melt, make liquid, make clear, clarify," from Latin liquidus "fluid, liquid, moist" (see liquid (adj.)). Sense of "clear away" (a debt) first recorded 1755. The meaning "wipe out, kill" is from 1924, possibly from Russian likvidirovat, ultimately from the Latin word. Related: Liquidated; liquidating.

also from 1570s

Entries linking to liquidate

liquid(adj.)

late 14c., "flowing, capable of flowing; neither solid nor gaseous," from Old French liquide "liquid, running" (13c.), from Latin liquidus "fluid, liquid, moist," figuratively "flowing, continuing," also of sounds and voices, from liquere "be fluid," related to liqui "to melt, flow," from PIE *wleik- "to flow, run."

In English, of sounds from 1630s. Financial sense of "capable of being converted to cash" is first recorded 1818, from earlier use in Scots Law (17c.) in reference to debts that had been proved (in court, etc.).

liquidation(n.)

1570s, in law, of debts, noun of action from past-participle stem of Late Latin liquidare "melt, make liquid" (see liquidate). Originally as a legal term in reference to assets; of companies going out of business, 1869; of inconvenient groups of persons, "a killing, a wiping out," 1925 in communist writings. In O. Henry, "the act of taking a drink of liquor."

liquidator(n.)

1825, agent noun in Latin form from liquidate (v.). By 1949 in the "killer" sense.

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