Quick question. I have been wracking my brains trying to think of an equivalent word to 'starved' for the act of killing someone by denying them water rather than food. ie. "The evil man ******* him to death"
Anyone have an answer?
Quick question. I have been wracking my brains trying to think of an equivalent word to 'starved' for the act of killing someone by denying them water rather than food. ie. "The evil man ******* him to death"
Anyone have an answer?
Zom is correct, "exsiccate" is the correct word, though it's so uncommon most might be loath to use it. However, if the villain himself uses it gleefully, it can easily be woven into the story. Obviously, this guy has contemplated this for a long time, and would invest the time to learn all about it. However, "starving" a person of water is a difficult thing and takes time. The more common death along the same lines is simple diarrhea, which remains one of the leading cases of death across the globe. And there are many things which he could use to inflict it (mostly viral).
However, "starving" a person of water is a difficult thing and takes time.
Not as long as you seem to think, starving to death takes 3 weeks, but you will die of dehydration in only three days with no water available.
http://www.livescience.com/32320-how-long-can-a-person-survive-without-water.html
Zom is correct, "exsiccate" is the correct word,
Exisccate describes actively removing the moisture from something, mostly inanimate objects. A living organism will die without continuous access to water the medical term for this is dehydration. The process described by Finbar_Saunders involves the denial of access to water, not the deliberate removal of water from a living human body, so Dehydration is the proper term and exisccate is wrong
Edited to add if you actually find a way to exisccate a human body without killing the person by some other means first, perhaps by burial in salt up to the neck, the process of death by dehydration could probably be speed up to take less than one day.
Exisccate describes actively removing the moisture from something
Definition of EXSICCATE (transitive verb)
: to remove moisture from
Definition of DEHYDRATE (transitive verb)
: to remove water or moisture from (something, such as food)
: to lose too much water
Examples of DEHYDRATE
Salt dehydrates the meat and keeps it from spoiling
Seems actively to me ...
Salt dehydrates the meat and keeps it from spoiling
Seems actively to me ...
Look closer at the second definition of Dehydrate
: to lose too much water
Every living organism requires water to live and we are constantly loosing water through respiration, perspiration, and waste excretion. These are passive processes that happen whether we want them too or not which is why we need to constantly drink more water.
Also, these are only the non-technical definitions. Try looking up the medical definition. Dehydration is the proper medical term for what happens to the human body when we loose too much water without being able to replace it and that is the term that would appear as the cause of death on the official death certificate for someone who died from such causes.
Try looking up the medical definition
I am not a medical expert, and I suspect the vast majority of the readers wont be either.
There's an old torture where people are staked out in the sun and left to die of thirst - but I can't think of another word to use - maybe a thesaurus would help
have been wracking my brains trying to think of an equivalent word to 'starved' for the act of killing someone by denying them water rather than food. ie.
Dehydrated is the proper term.
The evil man withheld water until his lips split open and not a drop of moisture remained inside his mouth. He died with his swollen tongue hanging out.
he evil man withheld water until his lips split open and not a drop of moisture remained inside his mouth. He died with his swollen tongue hanging out.
Finbar is looking for a single word that describes the process / cause of death, not a lengthy graphic description.
Also, I don't think the tongue could swell while it is drying out at the same time. A significant portion of the cells in you body is water, so I would think that if anything, dehydration would cause the tongue to shrink, not swell.
Finbar is looking for a single word that describes the process / cause of death, not a lengthy graphic description.
Well, dehydration is a noun. It would have to be dehydrate. And I don't think "the evil man dehydrated him to death" is the best way to say he made the man die of thirst.
So I thought the best way was to show it.
Also, I don't think the tongue could swell while it is drying out at the same time.
I used the swelling tongue from cowboy movies I've watched over the years when cattle didn't have water and they died of thirst. In some movies, their tongues swelled. You made me think it was a Hollywood gimmick so I Googled it. Notice the 3rd bullet:
Symptoms of Dehydration
As a person dies from lack of food and fluids, his or her
Mouth dries out and become caked or coated with thick material
Lips become parched and cracked
Tongue swells, and might crack
Eyes recede back into their sockets
Cheeks become hollow
Lining of the nose might crack and cause the nose to bleed
Skin hangs loose on the body and becomes dry and scaly
Urine becomes highly concentrated, leading to burning of the bladder
Lining of the stomach dries out and he or she experiences dry heaves and vomiting
Body temperature becomes elevated
Brain cells dry out, causing convulsions
Respiratory tract dries out, and the resulting thick secretions can plug the lungs and cause death
Notice the 3rd bullet:
I notice it, I just don't get how that can happen when the body is dehydrating.
Most of our body mass /volume is water logically dehydration should cause all the soft tissues to shrink.
I can't find anything that offers an explanation for why dehydration would cause the tongue to swell.
I can't find anything that offers an explanation for why dehydration would cause the tongue to swell.
Wild Arse Guess.
An erection results when less blood is being returned back to the body than is being pumped in to the penis.
It's a result of the contraction of the blood vessels that return the blood.
Most likely the swelling of the tongue is a result of the same sort of effect; as a result of the body trying to lose heat (difficult to do without enough water) and conserve water.
body trying to lose heat ... and conserve water
In situations when the total body intake of water is low, the kidneys conserve water by increasing the absorption of water that is stored in soft tissues. [med-health.net]
In situations when the total body intake of water is low, the kidneys conserve water by increasing the absorption of water that is stored in soft tissues. [med-health.net]
Yep, which is a problem because sweating is a significant method for the body to get rid of excess heat, as is the movement of more blood to the outer layers of the skin; which is problematic when significantly dehydrated as the blood volume is significantly reduced resulting in low blood pressure. Moving more to the surface helps with heat loss, but results in further dropping in blood pressure.
It's not just the screwing up of electrolyte levels that causes problems when dehydrated.
3/12/2015, 11:36:49 AM
Can't manage one word, how about 'terminally dehydrate(d)'
Maybe a desiccated corpse, will do.
Thanks for the marvellous response. It's exactly what I was going through as I was trying to think about it.
I guess it's not an action that can be conveyed in the same way as starving from lack of food.
Dessicating and the, to this point completely unknown word: Exisccate are great for describing the technical act. What I was trying to find out is whether there is single, commonly used word equivalent to 'starve' when used in the phrase "He *****ed him to death." I really don't think one exists. Instead one has to write around the idea as in "He caused him to die of thirst."
I meant, there's no such phrase as "he thirsted him to death" is there ???
He starved him of water.
From Dictionary.com:
"to die or perish from lack of food or nourishment."
Water is nourishment.
and also from them:
"to cause to suffer for lack of something needed or craved."
Something needed works for water.