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Fine Dictionary

ruin

ruɪn
WordNet
Turkey and other birds at classic ruins in a park
Turkey and other birds at classic ruins in a park
  1. (v) ruin
    fall into ruin
  2. (v) ruin
    deprive of virginity "This dirty old man deflowered several young girls in the village"
  3. (v) ruin
    destroy completely; damage irreparably "You have ruined my car by pouring sugar in the tank!","The tears ruined her make-up"
  4. (v) ruin
    reduce to ruins "The country lay ruined after the war"
  5. (v) ruin
    reduce to bankruptcy "My daughter's fancy wedding is going to break me!","The slump in the financial markets smashed him"
  6. (v) ruin
    destroy or cause to fail "This behavior will ruin your chances of winning the election"
  7. (n) ruin
    destruction achieved by causing something to be wrecked or ruined
  8. (n) ruin
    a ruined building "they explored several Roman ruins"
  9. (n) ruin
    failure that results in a loss of position or reputation
  10. (n) ruin
    an event that results in destruction
  11. (n) ruin
    the process of becoming dilapidated
  12. (n) ruin
    an irrecoverable state of devastation and destruction "you have brought ruin on this entire family"
Illustrations
View of the Tintern Abbey ruins
View of the ruins of Dryburgh Abbey
View of Haarlem.
Dune view with the ruins of Brederode castle near Santpoort
Dune landscape with the ruins of Brederode castle in Santpoort. A woman with a dog is standing on a path to the ruin.
Landscape with the ruins of Brederode castle in Santpoort
A praying hermit in a ruin. An old man sits with folded hands and a book on his lap on the ground under a barren tree.
A praying hermit in a ruin
Donkey drivers near an Italian ruin, in the distance an old stone bridge.
Donkey drivers at an Italian ruin
Dune landscape with brick ruins, in the foreground a pond with a broken tree trunk.
Landscape with ruins
River landscape with the ruin of a castle. At the bank of the river is a boat with two people.
River landscape with ruin
Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary
Interesting fact
President Eisenhower also banished squirrels from the grounds because they were ruining the green.
  1. Ruin
    Such a change of anything as destroys it, or entirely defeats its object, or unfits it for use; destruction; overthrow; as, the ruin of a ship or an army; the ruin of a constitution or a government; the ruin of health or hopes. "Ruin seize thee, ruthless king!"
  2. Ruin
    That which promotes injury, decay, or destruction. "The errors of young men are the ruin of business."
  3. Ruin
    The act of falling or tumbling down; fall. "His ruin startled the other steeds."
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
Interesting fact
The world's highest railway is in Peru. The Central Railway climbs to 15,694 feet in the Galera tunnel, 108 miles from Lima. Tourists take it to get to the ruins of Machu Picchu.
  1. (n) ruin
    The act of falling or tumbling down; violent fall.
  2. (n) ruin
    A violent or profound change of a thing, such as to unfit it for use, destroy its value, or bring it to an end; overthrow; downfall; collapse; wreck, material or moral: as, the ruin of a government; the ruin of health; financial ruin.
  3. (n) ruin
    That which promotes injury, decay, or destruction; bane.
  4. (n) ruin
    That which has undergone overthrow, downfall, or collapse; anything, as a building, in a state of destruction, wreck, or decay; hence, in the plural, the fragments or remains of anything overthrown or destroyed: as, the ruins of former beauty; the ruins of Nineveh.
  5. (n) ruin
    The state of being ruined, decayed, destroyed, or rendered worthless.
  6. (n) ruin
    Synonyms Subversion, wreck, shipwreck, prostration.
  7. ruin
    To bring to ruin; cause the downfall, overthrow, or collapse of; damage essentially and irreparably; wreck the material or moral well-being of; demolish; subvert; spoil; undo: as, to ruin a city or a government; to ruin commerce; to ruin one's health or reputation.
  8. ruin
    Specifically, to bring to financial ruin; reduce to a state of bankruptcy or extreme poverty.
  9. ruin
    Synonyms To destroy, overthrow, overturn, overwhelm.
  10. ruin
    To impoverish.
  11. ruin
    To fall headlong and with violence; rush furiously downward.
  12. ruin
    To fall into ruins; run to ruin; fall into decay; be dilapidated.
  13. ruin
    To be overwhelmed by loss, failure, suffering, or the like; be brought to misery or poverty.
  14. ruin
    To inflict ruin; do irreparable harm.
Chambers's Twentieth Century Dictionary
Interesting fact
Owing to a faulty cornerstone, the church of St. John in Barmouth, Wales, crashed in ruins a minute after it was finished. It was rebuilt, and the new edifice has endured to the present day.
  1. (n) Ruin
    rōō′in a rushing or falling down violently: destruction: overthrow: that which destroys: the remains of a building demolished or decayed (usually in pl.): the state of being ruined: wreck, material or moral
  2. (v.t) Ruin
    to demolish: to destroy: to defeat: to impoverish: to bring to ruin: to undo: to spoil: to seduce, debauch
  3. (v.i) Ruin
    to run to ruin: to fall into decay: to do irreparable harm
  4. (v.i) Ruin
    (Spens.) to fall:—pr.p. ru′ināting; pa.p. ru′ināted
  5. (adj) Ruin
    (obs.) falling to ruin: ruined
Quotations
Ralph Waldo Emerson
A man is a god in ruins.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
An archaeologist is someone whose career lies in ruins.
Source Unknown
Oscar Wilde
A kiss may ruin a human life.
Oscar Wilde
I was never ruined but twice; once when I lost a lawsuit and once when I won one.
Voltaire
Josh Billings
Life is short, but it's long enough to ruin any man who wants to be ruined.
Josh Billings
Pain is such an uncomfortable feeling that even a tiny amount of it is enough to ruin every enjoyment.
Will Rogers
Idioms

Rack and ruin - If something or someone goes to rack and ruin, they are utterly destroyed or wrecked.

Etymology

Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary OE. ruine, F. ruine, fr. L. ruina, fr. ruere, rutum, to fall with violence, to rush or tumble down

Usage in the news

Let's Ruin a Summer Tradition. 98kool.com

Add this to the list of things we used to do all the time as kids that have now been totally RUINED. 98kool.com

Now they tour Europe and explore romance and ruins. tulsaworld.com

' Geezer ' won't let thugs ruin his walks. philly.com

Beneath the ruins of Genghis Khan 's capital city in Central Asia, archaeologists discovered artifacts from cultures near and far. smithsonianmag.com

A place to put utility scale plants that won't ruin the desert. hcn.org

Not cool, but don't let it ruin the rest of the memorial park. observer.com

But I don't want to ruin the suspense either. observer.com

Do Running Birds Ruin Pointing Dogs. gundogmag.com

Queens Broker Is Accused of Bringing Immigrants' Ruin. nytimes.com

If there's one thing we love about fall, it's rocking a blowout without summer heat ruining our sleek tresses. essence.com

How much lead does it take to ruin a brain. bur.org

Showing Hama in ruins, Syria says revolt quelled. foxnews.com

I will stop at nothing to ruin your campaign. northcoastjournal.com

Pistons coach once nearly ruined 76ers with bad personnel decisions. msnbc.msn.com

Usage in scientific papers

Another situation that can be encountered in ruin theory is the random sum of claims, P ei , where ei are i.i.d. random variables with known exponential distribution.
Comparing Two Contaminated Samples

This would ruin the condition that i∗ : H1 (MK ; Z) ≃−→ H1 (W ; Z) is an isomorphism, which is necessary for a 4-manifold to be a slice disc complement.
A Second Order Algebraic Knot Concordance Group

The use of the equations of motion does not ruin the 1/Nc power counting in (49), although it introduces additional products of traces and powers of derivatives of ˆθ in (23).
Chiral Effective Lagrangian in the large-Nc limit: the nonet case

Similar corrections could ruin the degeneracy of squarks.
M Theory and Cosmology

However, this would ruin the original distribution.
New Lattice Based Cryptographic Constructions

Usage in literature

The ruins of this city may still be seen near the modern Sevastopol. "Historic Tales, Vol. 8 (of 15)" by Charles Morris

There was an old wall across the pass, now in ruins. "Historic Tales, vol 10 (of 15)" by Charles Morris

But although from a distance the castle on the green island seems utterly dismantled, it is not, even now, all ruin. "The Light of Scarthey" by Egerton Castle

I am ruined, entirely ruined! "The Son of Monte Christo" by Jules Lermina

It was a meagre old town, long since in ruins, the fosses and castle of which had been hastily repaired. "The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 9" by Various

The villages, which are mostly in ruins, are built on the sides of the rocks. "Celebrated Travels and Travellers" by Jules Verne

But you persuaded him to labor there, and paid him in whiskey, and it ruined him, and ruined us all. "Select Temperance Tracts" by American Tract Society

We are ruined, and you are ruined too. "Woman on Her Own, False Gods & The Red Robe" by Eugène Brieux

This is not the place for detailed descriptions of these ruins. "The Book of the National Parks" by Robert Sterling Yard

He turned his head at last, and his eyes rested upon the circular wall, four hundred feet below, that enclosed the temple ruins. "The Rhodesian" by Gertrude Page

Usage in poetry
Love cannot die!
'Tis Deity!
'Tis bliss, pure, bright, supernal;
Though worlds shall fall
To ruin, — all,
Yes, all of Love 's eternal!
Stoop closer to the ruined wall,
Whereon the wilful wilding sleeps,
As if its home were waterfall
By dripping clefts and shadowy steeps.
My mother, ere the sounds had ceast,
Burst in, and drew me down:
Her joy o'erpowered us both, her breast
Covered lost friends and ruin'd town.
Let's ne'er forget, 'till turn'd to clay,
To praise our Saviour, night and day,
Who has our souls from ruin bought!
For us, what wonders has he wrought?
But the billows are lost in a whelming wave,
Whose voice shall be never weary;
And Fancy has withered, like weeds on the grave
Of my loved, my ruined Mary.
But I have straightened out
Ruin, wreck and wrack;
I toiled long years and at length
Came to so deep a thought
I can summon back
All their wholesome strength.