as·sas·si·nate

(ə-săs′ə-nāt′)

tr.v. as·sas·si·nat·ed, as·sas·si·nat·ing, as·sas·si·nates

1. To murder (a prominent person) by surprise attack, as for political reasons.

2. To destroy or injure treacherously: assassinate a rival's character.

as·sas′si·na′tion n.

as·sas′si·na′tive adj.

as·sas′si·na′tor n.

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

ThesaurusAntonymsRelated WordsSynonymsLegend:

Noun	1.	assassination - an attack intended to ruin someone's reputation blackwash, character assassination calumniation, calumny, defamation, hatchet job, traducement, obloquy - a false accusation of an offense or a malicious misrepresentation of someone's words or actions
	2.	assassination - murder of a public figure by surprise attack murder, slaying, execution - unlawful premeditated killing of a human being by a human being

assassination

noun murder, killing, slaughter, purge, hit (slang), removal, elimination (slang), slaying, homicide, liquidation She would like to investigate the assassination of her husband.

Quotations
"Assassination is the quickest way" [Molière Le Sicilien]
"Assassination is the extreme form of censorship" [George Bernard Shaw The Rejected Statement]

Collins Thesaurus of the English Language – Complete and Unabridged 2nd Edition. 2002 © HarperCollins Publishers 1995, 2002

Translations

إغْتِيال

vražda

snigmord

Mordanschlag

asesinato

assassinat

orgyilkosság

morî

umor

assassination

[əˌsæsɪˈneɪʃən] N → asesinato m

Collins Spanish Dictionary - Complete and Unabridged 8th Edition 2005 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1971, 1988 © HarperCollins Publishers 1992, 1993, 1996, 1997, 2000, 2003, 2005

assassination

[əˌsæsɪˈneɪʃ^ən] n → assassinat m

Collins English/French Electronic Resource. © HarperCollins Publishers 2005

assassination

n → (geglücktes) Attentat, (geglückter) Mordanschlag (→ of auf +acc); assassination attempt → Attentat nt; to plan an assassination → ein Attentat planen; before/after the assassination → vor dem Attentat/nach dem (geglückten) Attentat

Collins German Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged 7th Edition 2005. © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1980 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1997, 1999, 2004, 2005, 2007

assassination

[əˌsæsɪˈneɪʃ/ən] n → assassinio

Collins Italian Dictionary 1st Edition © HarperCollins Publishers 1995

assassinate

(əˈsӕsineit) verb

to murder, especially for political reasons. The president was assassinated by terrorists.

asˌsassiˈnation noun

asˈsassin noun

a person who assassinates.

Mentioned in

References in classic literature

I hoped your house would have been some other one than this; as if there was not another house at Auteuil than that of the assassination!"

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The scientific world had barely had time to recover from the effect of this news, when it learned of the attempted assassination of Mademoiselle under the extraordinary conditions which we have detailed and which our visit to the chateau was to enable us to ascertain with yet greater precision.

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But at the word "assassination" the uproar broke out again.

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Passepartout was now the only person left in the car, and the Elder, looking him full in the face, reminded him that, two years after the assassination of Joseph Smith, the inspired prophet, Brigham Young, his successor, left Nauvoo for the banks of the Great Salt Lake, where, in the midst of that fertile region, directly on the route of the emigrants who crossed Utah on their way to California, the new colony, thanks to the polygamy practised by the Mormons, had flourished beyond expectations.

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"I pardon you," said he, "for the poisoning of my brother, and the assassination of his Grace, Lord Buckingham.

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I was trusted with the secret of Colonel Herncastle's plan for escaping assassination. I received the Colonel's letters, periodically reporting himself a living man.

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I leave others to draw their own conclusions in reference to the secret of the assassination as I have drawn mine.

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It was not until that remarkable document was made public that the world dreamed of there being any connection between the assassination of the King and Queen of Portugal and the murders of the New York City police officers.

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"It is some cowardly assassination," said De Guiche.

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The disquieting ideas of theft or assassination never disturbed them.

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Assassination, however, is rampant, but even this could not have been the motive of my stealthy friend, for he might easily have killed me had he desired.

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Fouquet to be put an end to with the same readiness, indeed, as his predecessor had caused the assassination of le Marechal d'Ancre; and so he disguised the terrible resolution he had formed beneath one of those royal smiles which, like lightning-flashes, indicated coups d'etat .

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