cut to pieces

English

Pronunciation

• Audio (General Australian):

  (file)

Verb

cut to pieces (third-person singular simple present cuts to pieces, present participle cutting to pieces, simple past and past participle cut to pieces)

1. To cut, chop, slice etc. so as to form smaller pieces.
2. (idiomatic, transitive) To utterly defeat or overwhelm.
   • 2000, Papa Roach, Last Resort:

     Cut my life into pieces. This is my last resort. Suffocation, no breathing, don't give a fuck if I cut my arm bleeding.

   • 2008, Samuel John Hazo, This Part of the World: A Novel, →ISBN, page 91:

     You will be firing down on them, and you can use everything you have, even mortars. You will cut them to pieces.

   • 2010, Vice Magazine, The World According to Vice, →ISBN:

     Last time we played Cardiff, in the early 80s, we kicked the fuck out of them, cut them to pieces.

   • 2012, David Henry Montgomery, The Leading Facts of English History, →ISBN:

     They were hotly pursued by the English, who, having lost but a single vessel in the fight, might have cut them to pieces, had not Elizabeth's suicidal economy stinted them in body powder and provisions.

   • 2015, George R.R. Martin, Wild Cards 18-20: The American Heroes Triad, →ISBN:

     Ana could imagine watching this on TV at home, and how exciting it must be. How gleeful the audience would be, watching Downs cut them to pieces.

Translations

cut to form smaller pieces

• Greek:

  Ancient: κατατέμνω (katatémnō)