▪ I. ˈruinating, vbl. n.
[f. ruinate v. + -ing1.]
The action of ruining.
| 1594 Plat Jewell-ho. iii. 4 The principall meanes of the ruinating of all mortall bodies. 1614 Camden Rem. 199 The sodaine ruinating of Townes by the Saxons. 1642 in J. B. Williams Eng. Journalism (1908) 34 This was the first step to the ruinating of the tribe of clerks. |
▪ II. ˈruinating, ppl. a.
[f. as prec. + -ing2.]
1. That ruins; destructive, destroying.
| 1608 Dekker Dead Tearme Wks. (Grosart) IV. 46 Free from the mallice..of ruinating Time and the enuious blasts of Fortune. 1688 S. Sewall Diary 10 Jan., Not abiding in, or apostatizing from Christ, is a ruinating evil. 1720 T. Boston Fourfold State iv. ii, It is not the venomed ruinating thing wrapt up in the sanction of the first covenant. 1799 J. Scott Bahar-Danush II. xxvi. 307 The ruinating hailstones beat upon the garden. |
2. Falling to ruin; decaying.
| 1634–5 Brereton Trav. (Chetham Soc.) 173 Small parcels of the walls..continue, surviving monuments of that ruinating, large, and stately fabric. |