lay waste
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
The trebuchet was the most fearsome weapon of medieval times, a giant catapult that could lay waste to any fortress by battering its walls with boulders.
From Slate ● Jul. 7, 2025
Tactical nuclear weapons, as the term implies, are far smaller and less powerful than strategic nuclear armaments such as intercontinental ballistic missiles carrying nuclear payloads that could lay waste to large population centers.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 6, 2024
All that can contaminate water and soil, not to mention lay waste to large tracts of land.
From Science Magazine ● Nov. 1, 2022
But by March 2013, he’d be dead of cancer, and you could feel something malignant about to lay waste to his country’s social and economic body.
From New York Times ● Mar. 15, 2022
That fascination has infested me today like the wood-eating bugs that slowly lay waste to our house.
From "Challenger Deep" by Neal Shusterman
